The Stars Still Shine Over Time
by Stella Stargaze
Summary: No matter the changes, no matter the time, the stars will still shine. Among a rising group of Mavericks, one in particular has stump the hunters. The newest member has spun them around and around. Can they figure this girl out and stop this gang of Mavericks before they complete their plan... whatever that is.
1. Gravity

**Okay, I said that I would post it in a couple hours, but it turned into like, a week. I started working on my wings for a costume and basically broke my back bent over for so long and wifi at conventions sucks. So... yeah.**

 **SO here's my story to try and help you guys through my writers block. It's not Sonic like my other stories but I've been planning on expanding anyways. This also has a bit on a higher rating cause of... well it'd be a bit spiolerish but you should be able to get a pretty good guess out of the first chapter here.**

 **Anyway, enjoy!**

"No, I swear they announced it. It's coming out next month."

"They just announced that game last year. There's no way it's done already."

"Yes it is. I saw video footage. It comes out on the DS."

"Would you two stop? Look I can just google it now."

"Yes! Good work Ian! Prove me correct!"

Ian kept his eyes on his phone as he replied, "Working on it… Found it. She's right Nathan. They announced it a couple of days ago."

"No!" Nathan fell back on the ground in despair while their third companion cackled.

"Told ya! As always I am a fountain of knowledge!"

"You're not! You're so clueless about stuff!" Nathan complained, throwing the grass at them from the school yard.

"And yet I am the one who knew about the release date." A black van pulled up in front of the school, but they ignored it since a lot of cars came up to drop off kids. There was even a van they nicknamed 'cube-van' cause it looked like a perfect cube

"Uh huh. I'll bet you the game's gonna have a bunch of glitches though if they finished it that quickly." He knew he was defeated so might as well change the topic.

"I think glitches can be fun under the right circumstances."

"Yeah like the-"

"Ian, if you say it I will throw my backpack at you."

The black van parked across the street, but neither Nathan nor Ian took notice of this. The third group member however did. They didn't say anything though, and moved their attention back to their friends.

"Go for it." Ian challenged.

He received a suspicious narrowed glare, "You're going to steal my backpack if I do aren't you?"

"Yes."

Nathan laughed, "That was blunt."

"Yep." Ian responded bluntly, causing both of his companions to laugh.

Behind them a door opened and shut with a thud. The sound registered with the third person. They turned their head slightly to see a man in a large black trench coat and sunglasses, which was strange since it was pretty warm and sunny out.

As they watched the man reached into his coat and pulled out something that shined in the morning light. That was the last thing they remembered.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

"X! Hey X!"

Said repliod turned toward the voice, seeing a familiar gunner running his way, "Axl? What's up?"

The younger bot ran up beside the blue hunter who had stopped to let him catch up, "I've been looking for you everywhere. Commander Signas requested us to talk to him in his office. Zero's already headed there."

"Alright then. Let's go." X started walking in the direction of the office, "Do you know what this is about?"

Axl shook his head, "No clue. I thought I heard something about a group that was causing trouble."

"Heard something or eavesdropped something?"

"…"

X rolled his eyes in slight amusement at his friend's mischievous actions. The base certainly was a lot livelier since the gunner had joined the team.

"Okay then. Anything else?"

Axl looked up in thought, his hand moving up to his chin, "I think there was something about that Gravity team or something. That one's a bit iffy."

"Gravity? Hadn't they gone quiet for awhile?"

The younger boy shrugged, "I guess they came back? Like I said I'm not completely sure about that part."

"Well I guess we're about to find out." Axl almost walked past the door due to him being so lost in his thoughts, trying to determine the details of their summons. X managed to catch him before he got too far and pushed the door open.

Zero was already there waiting for them, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed across his chest. He nodded to the two as they entered. Signas was behind his desk and stood when they walked in.

"You wanted to talk to us sir?" X asked.

"Yes. There seems to have been an uprising in maverick activity lately. The last few weeks to be exact." Signas explained.

X's eyebrows furrowed in concern, "How much of a rise sir?"

"A 15% rise X." Axl whistled slowly in astonishment. That was a high rise for a short amount of time.

"What could cause a rise like that?" Axl thought out loud.

"We believe that the outbreaks were all planned." He stopped for a moment, watching the hunters' reactions. Axl seemed slightly surprised; he probably would have been more surprised if he hadn't been eavesdropping. X's eyes widened but he managed to keep a calm domineer. Zero simply raised an eyebrow. Not much seemed to surprise him. Except Axl's pranks. But those never really ended well.

"What makes you think that?" Zero asked, moving from his position to stand next to X.

"There was a quote left at every attack. 'No good deed goes unpunished.'"

"Wasn't that the quote Gravity would use?" X asked as Axl made a tiny fist pump at his side.

Signas nodded affirmative. Gravity was a group of repliods who had made themselves known about half a year ago. They acted just as any maverick group did, but did it with more… 'personality'. They tagged their targets with the quote 'No good deed goes unpunished' after they were done with whatever they were doing there. They still weren't sure why they had chosen this line or why they put it wherever they went. Witnesses also said that they heard the team talking about "Keeping this world grounded". They really couldn't figure these guys out, but that's what happens when you're dealing with mavericks.

"So what are we going to do?"

"We're keeping a close eye out for any more activity. You three will be summoned immediately as soon as we find something. Until then you three need to be ready at a moment's notice." Signas sat, indicating the end of the meeting.

"Sir." All three spoke in chorus before exiting.

"Those guys again." Zero scoffed as soon as the door had closed. "This is going to be a real pain."

"Could probably be worse," Axl replied with his usual optimism.

"He's right Zero. Stop complaining," X slightly scolded as they started their way towards the lounge area.

Zero didn't respond. He just rolled his eyes and continued walking beside X.

"Wonder why they were quiet for so long," Axl stated as he walked on the opposite side of X.

"Licking their wounds most likely," the red hunter replied simply. "Their last operation was a disaster."

Axl snickered, "Didn't one of them blow themselves up before we even got there?"

"Yes," X sighed.

"Makes our job easier," Zero had a small smile tugging at his lips.

This time X rolled his eyes. 'These two.' That was a thought that came to his mind often when he was with his friends.

When they reached the lounge room Axl immediately dashed off to the small food stand at the far end of the room. Of course they didn't need to eat but they still could. It was more for pleasure than necessity.

The room was a warm pale yellow with white couches and chairs set around the room, surrounding multiple clear tables. There was a small booth at the back that sold different snacks and drinks that Axl really liked. They had small tvs set around the room as well and you could usually find at least one repliod watching them since many of the hunters didn't have tvs in their quarters.

X and Zero sat at one of the small tables near a tv and soon Axl came over and joined them with an ice cream cone (he seemed to have a weakness for sweets) and watched multiple different programs for a few hours until all three heard a small ping from their helmets.

"Already?" Axl asked, still with a little ice cream left on his chin.

"Come on," X told him while subtly motioning for him to wipe off the left over snack.

Axl did so and the three headed for the command room.


	2. New Girl

**Welp I'm sick. But hey, I'm going to put up a chapter anyway. Don't have much else to do, tho I might take a nap after this. Hopefully my cat will stop yelling long enough for me to fall asleep.**

 **Anyway, enjoy and please review! X3**

"There you guys are."

As soon as they had entered, Alia had called them over, still typing away at her keyboard. There were many other Navs around her staring intently at the screens in front of them. A few of them seemed like they would shut down at any moment.

"Gravity start acting up?" X asked, leaning down to view his Nav's screen.

"Yes. And it's a lot worse than we thought." She blew a piece of hair out her face. She must have been working for a while.

"Worse? What's going on?" Zero was already annoyed apparently.

Alia sighed, once again moving her hair out of her eyes, "They seem to be taking out some new tech for a test drive on a town."

"New tech?" X questioned.

"It looks like they've been gathering some old mechanaloids and upgrading them. Most likely with the equipment they've stolen in the past."

"How do we know it's them?" the blond hunter asked, apparently still not entirely sure if this really was Gravity.

"There have been sightings of the remaining members as well as a few spots where they have sprayed up that good deed quote." Alia informed him, not even bothering to look up.

"We better get out there before they hurt anyone." X started moving toward the teleport pad with his two partners right behind him.

Until Alia stopped them, "Wait. There's something else."

"What?" Axl asked, slightly bouncing in his impatience.

"There's also been sightings of another repliod."

"A new member?"

Alia nodded, "I suspect so. They seem to be commanding a lot of the mechanaloids. They must be very new though because a lot of people have been able to get away from them. It's like they're not even bothering with the citizens."

"Well we'll find out when we get there." Axl had run out of patience and was now standing next to the teleporter, trying to contain his hyperactivity.

Zero sighed, "Who thought it'd be a good idea to make a teenager repliod? He has way too much energy."

X softly laughed and went to join the hyper bot on the pad. "Come on. Let's get going before he explodes."

Zero sighed (though there was a touch of amusement and affection hidden in with the exhaustion, no matter what he says) and joined them.

"All set, Alia." The blue bomber informed.

"Be careful guys. They seem to be blocking out a lot of my signals. I won't be able to help out much."

"Got it."

"We'll be fine. We've handled worse right?"

"Right."

Alia shook her head fondly. Of course they would be okay. She wasn't even sure if anything _could_ kill them. "All right you three. No doing anything stupid." That was one thing she was sure those three could manage.

"Of course." Axl beamed, the least reliable in that department.

With that the three vanished into a beam to their mission.

When they arrived it took them a moment to take in the surrounding. The whole area was orange with flames coming out of the buildings. There was wreckage filling the streets and animals running in panic. All the humans seemed to have already fled because beside the small creatures scurrying around there was no sign of life.

"This is… a lot more damage than usual." Axl managed.

X nodded. By now he had grown accustomed to the destruction that mavericks could cause over his many years as a hunter. Of course that didn't mean he liked seeing it. "They usually don't go this far. Either they underestimated these mechanoliods they made, or they just don't care anymore."

"Well in any case let's get going and stop these creeps." Zero took out his saber and ran forward with the others right behind him.

For a while they didn't see anything but wreckage and fire, but after a few miles Axl caught something out of the corner of his eye.

"Guys." He whispered, just loud enough for them to hear him.

"What's wrong?" X lowered his voice, now on alert from Axl's sudden warning.

"I thought I saw something." The gunner slowly stalked toward the area he saw the movement.

Zero and X watched him silently. Until X saw something out of the corner of his eye as well. "Axl, watch out!"

The younger repliod whipped around to see a wolf like mechanoliod leaping toward him get destroyed by a buster shot 8 feet away from him. He fell on his rump, looking back and forth from the destroyed robot and X. He stood up and checked the area he had been planning to check.

He shook his head, "Nothing."

"That one must have snuck around while Axl was checking." Zero commented.

Axl began to rub the back of his head sheepishly.

They all froze when they heard growling. Slowly multiple wolf and cat mechanoliods trailed out of the shadows and flames. The three stood back to back, pointing their weapons at the attackers.

"Aw, come on. They're just playing."

The hunters' head snapped up to see a girl sitting in a hole on the side of one of the buildings about a story up. She had brown eyes and hair that went down to her shoulders covered by a teal and purple helmet. There was a dark violet gem on the front with white wing like attachments sprouting from it. She wore purple and teal armor. The chest armor had a teal stripe running down the middle and she also had a short striped skirt around her waist. Her wrist gauntlets had purple triangles with the top point starting at her elbow going down to her wrist. Underneath the armor was a navy blue body suit.

"Who are you?" X asked.

She winked, "I'm Madelyn. I'm sorta new around here so go easy on me, kay?"


	3. Madelyn

**I think my brain is broken.**

 **Bluestar Pallette: The gravity team was explained in the first chapter, and yes she was controlling all the mechanoliods that the trio were fighting. Thx for being my first reviewer BTW :3**

X raised an eyebrow at the strange girl. She didn't act hostile, but the mechanoliods around them definitely were.

"What?" Madelyn tilted her head, exuding an air of innocence. A good actor apparently, "Don't you like animals?"

"Not when they're trying to kill me," Axl snapped back. Actually, the two looked about the same age, not that appearance really mattered to robots.

A smaller black cat robot hopped up next to Madelyn and started yelling down at the three hunters, "Shh," the girl picked up the cat gently, "You just gotta know how to handle them," the cat bumped it's forehead onto her nose. "See?"

"I'd rather deal with them like this," Zero cut down the one closest to him, causing the rest around them to growl even louder.

"Told ya," Madelyn scolded, "Just try being friendly to them. They'll warm up to you."

"Uh huh. Right after they tear us to pieces," Axl shot back sarcastically.

The black cat hissed. "Maggie, shush." The teal and purple bot stood up, "Sorry. She's a bit hostile towards people she doesn't know."

Zero raised an eyebrow, "It has a name?"

A tinge of annoyance passed over Madelyn's face, "Yes _she_ does."

"What are you doing here? What's your goal?" X asked before one of his comrades could snap at her.

"They wanted to test me," she answered simply, "I guess they thought causing a bit of chaos was the best way." A faint beep came from her helmet and she stood quietly listening, "It looks like I've passed it too." She cheered after a moment.

"That's why you did this? Just some dumb test? You've destroyed people's homes!"

"Better than taking their lives." She shot back, straight faced.

All three stared at her. Why would she care about people's lives? She was a maverick. A maverick who just destroyed an entire town.

"Now if you'll excuse me," she turned around towards the inside of the building.

"Hey!" X dashed forward to try and stop her, but nearly fell over dodging an arrow.

Madelyn held a bow with a pale blue glow and a black handle, "I wouldn't if I were you."

And with that she disappeared into the building.

The group tried to pursue her, but they had nearly forgotten about the hoard of mechanoliods surrounding them. Zero slashed a few more that charged at him while X shot anything in range.

Axl had been shooting them down as well until one of the smaller cat ones managed to get close to him. It didn't attack him though. It just sat there staring at him, as if waiting for him to do something.

'What was it she said,' he tried to recall, 'She said something about being friendly to them?'

He decided to take a chance, and reached out to the mechanoliod.

"Axl, what are you-" The cat brushed it's head against his hand and started purring.

Axl stared at the robot, awestruck, before looking back at the group that had been previously trying to kill him. They were gone. There were a couple left staring at him like they wanted to be pet as well, but nothing hostile was even glancing his way. "Are you serious?" Axl almost yelled. (He was afraid yelling might set off the cat)

X took a moment to take in the scene before having to return to the hoard that was still very hostile towards him. He scanned the ranks and found a wolf like mechanoliod acting much like Axl's cat. He copied the gunner's actions and was rewarded with the same effect, except this time the wolf ran off after a few seconds of the petting.

"Zero," the red hunter waved at him, indicating that he knew what to do. And a minute later he had found a larger cat that wanted attention and dispersed the rest of the attackers.

"That was-"

"Weird."

X shook his head in exasperation, "Let's handle this back at HQ. We should probably get that," he pointed towards the cat sitting next to Axl, "analyzed."

"Yeah," the navy hunter reached down and scooped up the small bot, receiving loud purrs in response, "It's kinda cute. Think Signas will let us keep him if he's safe?"

"Uh. I don't know about that Axl." Geez this kid could bounce back from anything quick.

Zero didn't even respond. Just rolled his eyes and requested a teleport back to headquarters.


	4. Clueless clues

**Sorry about the lack of updates here. Some anxiety issues due to a girl on my color guard sort of turned off my brain for a while. Here's the newest chapter to make up for that. Enjoy! X3**

 **BlueStar Palette: There are** ** _so_** **many reasons that might be a bad idea I don't think I could even list them all XD**

"So did you get any useful information?" X asked.

It had been a couple of hours since the three had gotten back from their mission. The cat mechanoliod had been taken for examination almost immediately (though it did complain about being taken away from Axl). They had debriefed and changed out of their armor before coming back to see how the cat was doing. As soon as it spotted Axl it hopped up and started to jump around him. Currently he was playing with the cat while the other two talked with Alia, who had the information from the scans.

"Actually yes," Alia stacked up the papers in front of her and handed them to X, "It seems that Gravity used a special device that increased their intelligence."

"For increased intelligence they sure went down easily." Zero commented, looking over X's shoulder to read the papers.

"Yeah. That's the unusual thing," her expression changed to troubled as she went over the information, "The original programing for the robot was overridden. It originally was used for combat but someone changed it to make them more animal like."

"That girl?" X suggested, scanning through the data.

"Madelyn," Zero agreed, "She did talk about them more as animals than robots. But why?"

"Maybe the virus?" Alia tried.

X shook his head, "She wasn't showing any signs of the virus. She seemed as sane as a repliod working for Gravity could be."

"That girl is weird," Axl had now joined the group with his new cat friend sleeping on his shoulder.

"You're definitely right about that," X trailed off for a few seconds before giving an exasperated sigh, "Let's just put a pin in it until we've got more clues."

The others silently agreed.

"Axl, you realize the cat is going to have to be kept here right?" Alia informed the young reploid.

He nodded, "Yeah I know. Hey, maybe we should give it a name."

"Name?"

"Yeah! That way it'll be easier to identify it and we'll have a way for it to recognize that we're trying to get its attention." He looked hopefully at the two older hunters.

"Alright," X resigned, "What do you think we should name it?"

Axl's eyes lit up with childish joy and he began scanning the cat, trying to find a suiting name. "Kimyona," he eventually said.

"Huh?"

"It means strange in Japanese right?" Axl explained, "Well, this little guy sure is strange compared to any other mechanoliod we've fought."

"Sounds good to me," X agreed.

Alia giggled, "It does fit the little guy huh?"

"You know Japanese?" Zero asked.

"A little. I like to go online and people sometimes put up random Japanese." Axl rested his hands behind his head, careful not to disturb Kimyona.

"Why?"

"I don't know. It's the internet. It's probably a bunch of hard core anime fans or something."

"Whatever. Why don't you set… Kimyona down so we get going."

Axl looked a little sad but did agree. After they said goodbye to Alia, the group headed over to X's quarters. They spent a good amount of time there since they could get some privacy. The fact that it was probably the cleanest out of the three of the quarters was also part of it.

"That was certainly an interesting mission," Axl commented as he flopped down on X's couch. The gunner was wearing his usual navy tank and worn jeans with a used bullet tied around his neck as a necklace.

"Definitely," Zero agreed, taking a seat in one of the chairs. He wore a red sweatshirt and loose jeans. A lot of people liked to make jokes about how his hair would never fit in the hoodie. Of course they never said this to him. The only people who could probably do that would be X and the three Navs. Maybe Axl too, but he would still be harmed in some way.

X simply sighed, taking a seat beside Axl. He had on a white t-shirt with light blue sleeves. It was obvious that he had had it for a long time because it seemed to be worn in certain places. Dr. Cain had actually been the one to give it to him, and he didn't have the heart to throw it away.

"What are we supposed to do now?" Axl asked, leaning back in his seat.

"I don't know," X admitted.

"We'll probably have to wait for them to show up again." Zero seemed aggravated by the prospect of waiting, but, of course, he had no choice.

No one else said anything for a while. They just sat and thought. When it started to get late Axl and Zero left for their own quarters, leaving X alone in his room. He knew he probably wouldn't get to sleep. He was definitely going to need a sub tank in the morning.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

Meanwhile at Gravity's stronghold, a shadow was jumping from cover to cover. She knew no members should be out in the base. Most of them were sleeping. Madelyn had gone out for an errand and wouldn't be back for a while. And their leader was holed up in his office researching or something like that.

But she still knew that she had to be careful. Gravity was cocky after their latest victory, especially the new girl. They felt like they were invincible. While that would work against them though, it also helped them. A few months ago they had so little moral she was pretty sure that even if they caught her they wouldn't do anything about it. But now, she knew that as soon as they realized that she was there, and what she was doing, she'd be dead.

The control center wasn't too far now. She clutched the flash drive in her hand. Soon it would contain Gravity's entire system. Then these mavericks would be history.

The door was unlocked and she quietly snuck into the room. In front of her a monitor loomed over her. On it where different blue prints, security camera footage (which none of them had caught her of course), and different plans for Gravity to carry out.

She plugged in the flash drive and started transferring data from the computer. About a quarter of the way through a loud siren blast through the air and red lights flashed through the room.

She quickly grabbed the flash drive and raced out of the door, locking it behind her to stall the group.

Madelyn was the first there. Of course the door didn't work since it had been locked and the rest of the team found her kicking at the door as hard as she could, creating cracks and splintering the wood.

"What's going on here?" one of them asked.

"What does it look like?" she shot back sarcastically, kicking again with a loud crack. The door gave way under Madelyn's assault and revealed only an empty room.

Stella had long since gone.


	5. Game plan

**My friends have been whining that they're not in this... they can suck it up. I know you're reading this Ian!**

 **Anyway, I've get a good amount of chapters written up already so I thought I might as well post another chapter real quick. Enjoy and please review!**

X woke up early and was surprised to find Axl sitting in the lounge room watching tv.

"What are you doing up so early?" Axl jumped at his voice.

He didn't seem to be completely awake, "Oh hi X."

"You okay?" X asked as he sat down next to him.

"Yeah," Axl yawned, "I just didn't really sleep last night."

"At all?"

Axl shook his head, "Not really. I kept thinking about all the weird stuff that's been happening. I eventually gave up and came out here."

X could relate to that. He hadn't gotten any sleep till late at night. But he still slept. "Maybe you should take the day off," X suggested, "Wouldn't want you falling asleep in the middle of a mission and blowing yourself up."

Axl laughed, "Alright I guess. Think you guys will be okay without me?"

X rolled his eyes, "I'm sure we'll be just fine." He ruffled the younger's hair and got up, "I'll go tell Signas, you go and try to sleep."

He yawned again, "Thanks X."

The blue hunter watched him leave then headed out himself. He informed Signas about Axl (the commander didn't seem to have gotten much sleep either) and headed to the training room. Again he was surprised to see his other comrade up so much earlier than usual.

"Zero?" the blonde hunter turned around at the sound of his friend's voice, "You're up too?"

"Too? Who else was awake?" Zero asked as he turned back to his simulation.

"Axl was watching tv. Apparently he hadn't gotten any sleep."

"None?" Zero cancelled the simulation and walked up to X.

X shook his head, "He said he couldn't stop thinking about all the stuff going on. I told him to go back to bed so he won't be joining us today."

Zero nodded, "Good idea. I didn't know he was capable of that much thought though."

X lightly punched him in the arm, snickering, "Well what are you doing out so early? In all the time I've known you the only reason I've ever seen you get up before 10 is a maverick attack."

Zero gave him a playful shove, "Whatever. I just wanted to get a little extra practice in. We're going to need it."

"Yeah. What simulation were you on?"

"It was one of the range attack maverick scenarios."

"Why that one in particular," as soon as the words left his mouth he realized, "Madelyn used a ranged attack to stop me from following her."

"Yep," he looked back towards the simulation device, "It takes a couple of minutes for me to get close enough to hit though."

"What if I distract her while you get close?"

Zero thought for a moment, "That would probably work. Let's try."

The crimson hunter approached the device and set the correct program. Different projections appeared in front of him. There were multiple buildings with a plain looking maverick in one of the windows, waiting for the hunters to begin.

X brought out his buster, took aim at the maverick, and nodded to Zero. He took off, saber in hand, towards the building while X rapidly shoot at the maverick to take its attention away from Zero. It worked too. It was like he didn't even notice Zero, he was too focused on the blue repliod assaulting him.

20 seconds had passed when Zero reached the building and started to scale the wall. By the time the maverick noticed him he was already in front of him slashing.

The simulation disappeared and the time and grade appeared above their heads.

'Time: 48 seconds Grade: S'

"Wow."

"You said it took you two minutes?"

"Yeah." He read over the time again, "It's not as easy when you're trying to dodge projectiles and get close."

"Well, we've got a game plan for next time they show up."

"And if there's other members?" Zero pointed out, "They wouldn't be dumb enough to only send her on a job. Especially if she's new."

"We should be able to take them easy enough. We've already dealt with them."

"They're not that tough anyw-"

Alia cut him short, communicating through their helmets. "X! Zero! We have a situation. Get down here immediately!"

They exchanged worried looks before rushing off.

"On our way Alia."

When they arrived they heard several Navs calling firefighting and medical units. Not helping the worry already set in their minds.

"Alia what's happening?" X instantly went to his Nav for information.

"Gravity is attacking a local hot spring park."

"What?" Zero exclaimed, "Why would-"

"I don't know Zero," Alia interrupted. "But we know that this time people are getting hurt and that there have been multiple reports of fires spreading through the park."

"We need to get in there now." X ran to the transporter. "Come on Zero."

"Right." Said hunter join the Light bot, "Ready to go Alia."

"Alright. I'll be provided support for this mission. Your main objective is to take out the mavericks and help any people you find. Don't worry about the fires, we have firefighting teams already headed out. If you come across anyone who's injured just get them to a safe place and signal the coordinates to me so I can send the medical teams to them. Got everything?"

"Yes."

"Then I'm sending you out. Good luck."


	6. Mineral Heist

**Merry late Christmas!**

 **As a late present heres a chapter and probably a few more through out the day. Hope you like it! :3**

 **Bluestar Palette: Don't worry I'll complete it. And thanks :)**

The transmission must have been slightly off because X came very close to being roasted.

X yelped, jumping away from the dancing flames in front of him.

"Are you okay, X?"

The repliod steadied himself before answering, "Yeah, fine."

"Sorry about that, X," Alia apologized through the communicator, "The heat and general chaos going on in the area has our systems acting up a little. There shouldn't be anything else."

"Are you sure?"

"Uh…"

"We'll worry about it later," Zero stated, "We have bigger things to worry about."

"Right," agreed X, "Which way Alia?"

"The reports are coming in from the north of you. It seems that one of them has gone into the caves connecting to the springs. While the other is searching for something near the spring."

"It's safe to say that the one in the cave is looking for something as well." Zero deduced, "The question is what are they looking for."

"We can ask them when we get there. Come on, Zero."

"Right."

There were trees burning everywhere they looked as they ran across the forest. Zero even almost got flattened by one if not for Layer's timely warning. X thought he heard the sound of helicopters above pour water on the worse areas but decided to not check. They needed to stop these maniacs before they hurt anymore people.

X shook the thought out of head and quickened his pace.

When they arrived, they stuck to the shadows of the trees, scooping out the area.

Madelyn was there with a shovel looking very frustrated. "How am I supposed to find some dumb mineral among all this dirt?!"

"Stop complaining." A large bulky repliod appeared out of the water, "Just put the dirt in the bag and we'll be able to find what we need."

"I would at least like to know what I'm looking for Tinboq!"

Said repliod walked up onto shore, ignoring her protests. His full name was Tinboq axe. He was much larger than Madelyn. His head looked like the rectangular medival helmet with a slight red glow coming from his eyes. His weapon was a large axe about the size of his head. He was very slow but could hit very hard.

"Hey! Tinman! Would you just answer me?" Madelyn tried.

"You will know in time."

"Grrrrrr!" She stabbed down her shovel and threw a bag filled with dirt at him, "If you're going to be frustrating then just take this back and leave!"

"Fine. I must turn in mine as well."

Madelyn glared at the spot where the repliod disappeared.

"What kind of minerals could they be looking for?" X whispered to Zero.

"I don't know but we need to try and put a stop to this and take those two out. We can get her to tell us why they were looking for minerals after we defeat her." Zero reached for his saber.

"Alright. But it didn't sound like Madelyn knew why either."

"Huh?" Said repliod whipped around to face the two. "Hey!"

"What? How did-"

"That was fast!" She exclaimed.

"Whatever! Let's just go!" Zero dashed out of the bushes with his Z saber in hand.

"Whoa!" Madelyn jumped back to avoid the hunter, wall jumping up a nearby tree to get away from the hunter and took out her bow.

"X!"

"Yeah! I got it." X took out his buster and started shooting up at the tree.

"Hey!" the maverick yelled when one got especially close to her spot in the tree.

While she was busy dealing with the blue hunter's shots, Zero made his way to her, just like they had done in the simulation. It was probably easier with all the brush around them.

Zero scaled the tree within seconds, appearing out of nowhere to the girl, "Wah!"

Zero slash out at her… but didn't hit. Something intercepted it.

He fell to the ground after the failed attack and looked up to find Madelyn now holding a saber in her hand, the bow seemingly have disappeared.

"Did I mention my bow turns into a saber?" she jumped down from her perch and started stalking towards the two. "Nice strategy though. Good job."

Zero's grip tightened around his own saber, glaring at the girl.

X appeared out of the bushes, pointing his buster at his opponent. "What were you looking for?"

"Potassium nitrite. –traite! Ni _trate_. Geez, cannot talk today."

"Potassium- You burned down a forest to find a random mineral like that?!" X exclaimed.

"Actually it was more of a distraction. The others took the other stuff we needed already."

"Distraction?!"

"Mm hm. Although don't tell the others I told you. They might get mad." She giggled to herself while the hunters gave her perplexed looks.

"Why would you want these anyway?"

"Ask them!" she exclaimed, annoyance laced tightly into her voice, "I tried to get them to tell me but they kept saying that I would run the risk of slipping the info since I was so new! Gah! Though I guess I did just tell you about the whole distraction thing. Eh." She shrugged.

"Well whatever," Zero stated, ignoring the little outburst, "Your coming with us."

"Sorry boys. Not today. Maybe some other time." She positioned herself into a fighting stance, holding her saber in front of her with both hands.

Both hunters prepared their own weapons as she charged towards them, but lowered them slightly when she took a sharp turn and disappeared into the forest.

"What is she up to?"

X's question was soon answered as a faint creaking was heard along with a "Timber!" in the distance. Shortly after, the two spotted a large flaming tree falling towards them.

They dashed out of the way before the great crash of the burning tree rang through the forest.

"Later guys!" they heard Madelyn yell from somewhere in the forest.

"Wait!" they tried to follow the sound of her voice but were promptly stopped as the flames of the tree quickly spread all around them. "Crap!"

"Alia we have a problem here!"


	7. Gracie

**Heres another chapter. Kinda later than I planned but I had some family stuff came up and my cousins are a lot more annoying than I remember.**

"Axl! Wake up!" Pallet banged on the said hunter's door until he himself came to the door.

Axl was wearing a ruffled tank and loose shorts when he appeared. Pallet, who didn't realize that the door had been opened quick enough, knocked her fist on Axl's face, "Ow! Pallet! What's wrong? I just fell out of the bed!"

"Nap times over Axl. We have an emergency!"

"Emergency? What happened?" Axl's previous drowsiness immediately disappeared, "Where's X and Zero?"

"Listen, we'll brief you over in the command room. Just put on your armor and get down there ASAP."

He nodded, "Got it."

The hunter ran back into his room while his Nav rushed back to her station.

A couple minutes later Axl dashed into the command room, making a B line for three familiar Navs, "What's going on?"

"About half an hour ago Gravity started attacking a local hot springs park. We sent X and Zero to intercept them. They encountered two members, one of them being Madelyn, who they engaged. But she apparently cut down a tree that had been caught on fire and ignited the area around them." Alia explained.

"And now we can't pinpoint their exact location because the extreme heat is messing with our equipment." Layer finished.

"So I basically have to go in there, find them, and try to help?"

"Yes," Alia confirmed, "And if you encounter any Gravity members try to take them out as well."

"Alright. I got it." Axl ran back to the teleporter. "All set!"

"Okay. Good luck."

This time the teleportation didn't land him directly into the flames, luckily for him. But he could still feel the heat from them.

He could barely tell if there had been any water dropped on the fires by the overhead copters. It seemed to be spreading at a constant pace.

Choosing a random direction, Axl started running through the flame infested forest.

He stopped suddenly when he thought he heard the crying of a small child nearby. 'A kid? Did they get separated from their parents?'

Deciding that X and Zero wouldn't mind the small detour, he set off towards the voice.

He was surprised by what he found. There was a girl who looked about 5 or 6 sniffling in a field with not much fire coming around her, and squatting down in front of her was Madelyn with a warm smile directed at the girl.

At first he thought she might have been the cause of the girl's crying but, "Do you need help sweetie?"

The little child nodded and continued sniffling, "Mo- Mommy and Dad- Daddy…. Behind." She pointed towards a pile of flaming tree trunks that had fallen.

"You got separated when those fell?" the girl nodded, "What's your name?"

"Gr-Gracie."

Madelyn held out her hand, "Well Gracie. How bout we get you back to your parents?"

Gracie smiled slightly and nodded, taking her hand.

Madelyn led her to a thinner area of the fallen trees, informing Gracie step back she took out her saber and cut through the trees until she could push down a space large enough for the girl to walk through. She peeked out through the gap and came back smiling.

"There you go sweetie. Your parents are right through there." There was a faint yelling coming through the hole, "Looks like they're trying to get to you." Gracie smiled and hugged Madelyn expressing her thanks continuously.

"You're welcome. But will you do something for me," she nodded, "Don't tell your mommy and daddy about me. I might get in trouble if you do. Okay?" The girl nodded once more and dashed through the hole. Hearing screams of delight from child and parents alike, she giggled.

"What the heck?" Axl revealed himself.

Madelyn jumped about five feet into the air with a high pitched yelp. "Where did you come from?!"

"Aren't you supposed be the bad guy?" he ignored her.

"Grrr." She glared at him, "How much of that did you see?"

"Enough."

"Listen," she told him in a death tone, taking out her saber. "Don't you _dare_ tell _anyone_."

"Why shouldn't I?" Axl asked, his hand hovering over his own weapon.

"A lot more is at stake here then you think," she was actually making Axl a little nervous. She was scary when he was mad. "I promise I'll explain it to you myself but for now," she pointed her saber at him, "You need to keep that big mouth of yours shut."

He thought for a second. She didn't seem like she was lying. And that sort of anger is not easily acted on the spot. Maybe she just doesn't want the others to know so she won't get in trouble.

"Alright," Axl finally decided, "But you better explain it. You promised."

A small smile came across Madelyn's face, "Thank you." She turned to leave, "Oh," she turned back, "Your friends are that way by the way." She jerked her thumb to the side.

Axl looked in the direction she pointed and when his eyes came back the strange repliod was gone.

Following her advice, he ran through the forest until he found a large area covered in flames with two figures inside it, "X? Zero?" he called.

"Took you long enough!" Zero shouted back.

Axl hovered up over the fire, "It's a big forest you know!" Axl shot back, keeping his promise to Madelyn, not saying how he had actually found them. "Come on! Jump up and I'll swing you over the flames."

"Alright." X looked around trying to find something to give him an extra boost to reach his flying friend.

He settled on a fallen tree that was less on fire than anything else around him. Of course it was still on fire but if he was only on it for a second then it shouldn't do any damage.

"Okay, Axl. Here I come." X jumped off the tree, propelling himself towards the gunner. Grabbing his hands, he was swung over the flames and landed safely on the other side. Soon after Zero landed next to him, followed by Axl.

"So now what?" Zero asked, "We don't know where Madelyn went or what they needed to get during the distraction."

"Distraction?"

"That's what Madelyn said," X told him, "Actually, did you happen to see her or anyone else on your way here?"

"Uh… No," Axl lied.

"Okay then," they apparently bought it, "They've probably gotten away by now."

"Well, then I'm bringing you back," Alia's voice pinged into their helmets. "I think the disaster control units can take it from here."

Without another word they were beamed back to headquarters.

"Signas is waiting for you in his office for debriefing," Layer informed them when they arrived.

"Thanks," Zero told her.

She blushed slightly and nodded.

On their way Axl stayed behind the other two hunters. The two occasionally glanced back at him; it was very strange for him to be so quiet and secluded.

"What's with Axl?" Zero whispered to X.

"I don't know," X answered in a similar manner, "He's been kinda off since he found us in the forest."

"Yeah, and he seemed a bit nervous when you asked if he'd seen anyone," so they didn't buy it _that_ much.

"Hmm." X looked back at Axl, who was looking down at the floor with a puzzled look on his face, "He's thinking a lot harder about all this than anything else we've done. What is it about this case that has him so hooked?"

"Madelyn."

X nodded. He wasn't this interested in the group before she came around.

"Maybe he has a crush on her."

X facepalmed at the blonde hunters joke. Zero chuckled at his reaction, now catching the attention of Axl.

"What's up?" he asked, running up beside them, "What's so funny?"

"Don't worry about it," X told him with Zero still smirking next to him.

They all entered the office, with Axl now very confused.

"Ah, there you are, " Signas greeted them.

"Yes sir. And I'm afraid I have some bad news," Signas stayed silent, waiting for X for continue. "We came across Madelyn near one of the hot springs looking for Potassium Nitrate. Tinboq Axe had been with her but left before we could do anything. She didn't know why they needed it, apparently she was still too new for them to tell her the details, but also mentioned that the raid was simply a distraction for stealing the other minerals that they need."

"I'll have to ask Alia to look into that," Signas commented to himself, "Continue."

"We tried to capture her but she knocked over a flaming tree and set the area on fire, trapping+ us in until Axl came and helped. After that Alia called us in."

"And what happened on your side Axl?" Signas asked.

He shrugged, "Not much. I just got lost in the forest for a little bit before I found them."

"In that case you're dismissed. You two might want to go to Lifesaver to check for any damage that fire might have caused."

"Sir."

"I guess I'll see you later then." Axl told them outside before darting off

The other two stared after the younger repliod for a minute before heading to the medical bay, still slightly worried about his strange behavior.


	8. Talk

**Geez I don't have much to do up here besides getting attacked by dogs. Oh well that means you get more chapters. :3**

 **Bluestar Palette: I think you'll like what's coming up with Madelyn ;3**

Signas slowly tapped his finger on his desk as he scanned through a report. He had been sent a flashdrive with data concerning a certain case. His agent had only been able to get part of the data but it was still plenty to go off of. It contained a list of minerals and multiple blueprints that were marked as scrapped. He would have to give the blueprints to his engineers to see if they could learn what they were trying to build. As for the minerals he'd have Alia do a search for what they could be used for.

He stopped and rubbed his eyes. His optics must be getting fuzzy by now. He had received the data in the middle of the night and had immediately started looking through it.

Of course he knew who had sent it. He just hoped that she'd be able to keep this up just a little longer.

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X walked throughout the HQ looking for a certain navy hunter. He wanted to try and talk to him, see what was making him act so weird. The blue bot often became a sort of therapist whenever he felt that one of his friends needed to talk. Even if they tried to say that they were fine, which is what Zero would usually do.

Axl never really thought about their cases much. He just shot at whatever was supposed to be the enemy, with banter and sarcastic remarks to boot. The fact that he couldn't sleep was kind of odd but not enough to worry about, but with him not talking as much and suddenly becoming anxious when he was questioned about the Gravity mavericks, he suddenly felt like there might be something going on.

' _Could_ he have a crush on that girl?' X thought, remarking back to Zero's comment yesterday. But he immediately mentally facepalmed and dismissed the idea.

A few minutes later he did come across another S-class hunter. Just not the one he was looking for.

"Hey," Zero greeted when he spotted him.

"Hey Zero. Have you seen Axl at all?" X asked.

Zero rolled his eyes, "Planning to play therapist on him?"

The blue hunter stared at him for a second before replying, "He's just been acting off lately so I wanted to see what was wrong."

"I don't think he'll admit to anything buddy," the blonde informed him, "He seems to want to keep whatever's happening in those circuits of his to himself."

"Doesn't mean I can't try." X countered.

Axl had actually been taking missions all day just to avoid X's little therapy session. He knows him well enough by now.

He was currently on a B rank mission, clearing out some mechanoliods from a recent maverick attack. Honestly he was only half focused on the mission. That girl was just stuck in his head. She was so frustrating! He couldn't understand a thing about her. She acted like a bad guy. Destroying cities, burning down forests, attacking them with a bunch of mechanoliods. But at the same time she constantly did things that went totally against the bad guy agenda. Reprograming the mechanoliods, helping that little girl, telling him where X and Zero were.

She couldn't be on their side could she? He had heard what she did when she faced X and Zero at the park. She had attempted to kill them. But then she ran away…

"Gah!" He burst out loud.

"Axl?" His Nav asked worriedly

Oops. Forgot about her. "Sorry. Just thinking."

"You've been doing that a lot lately." Pallet commented, "It's not like you."

"I guess it isn't," Axl admitted, "Maybe X is started to rub off on me."

The Nav chuckled, "Speaking of him, I've heard he's been looking for you."

"Which is why I'm here," Axl scanned the area, "Should we really be gossiping during a mission? Won't you get in trouble if Alia catches you?"

"Nah, I've heard her doing it with X too. As long as you don't get killed on my watch. By that large mechanoliod diving at you from above for example."

Axl jerked his head up to see a big bird robot hurtling down toward him. He quickly dove to the side, causing it to crash into the ground and explode.

"See. I'm doing my job just fine." Axl huffed a bit at his Nav even though she couldn't see him. "That should be all of them I think. We can have some lower class hunters scan the area one more time but you're done. I'll bring you back."

"Are you sure?" Axl asked.

"You can't avoid X forever Axl."

"I can sure try."

Pallet beamed up the young hunter, who pouted slightly upon his arrival.

"Big baby." She teased him.

Axl rolled his eyes and headed back to his quarters after saying good bye.

'Knowing my luck, X will find me before I even get near my room,' Axl thought as he glanced over the hallway to check for any blue hunters.

His luck rang true as he soon heard a familiar voice behind him, "Hey, Axl!"

Said hunter slightly winced but turned around toward the voice, "Hi, X."

X came up to him, followed by Zero who seemed to be trying to give him a warning look. "Where have you been?"

"Just doing a couple missions." He told him, "I sort of ran out of them though."

"Well, I've been looking for you everywhere. I wanted to talk with you."

Axl sighed, "I guessed."

Zero snickered, receiving a glare from X, "You've just been acting weird lately."

"Yeah. Pallet said that too."Axl admitted, "It's nothing. I promise."

X didn't look convinced. He stood there in silence, making Axl slightly uncomfortable. He almost told him just so X would stop looking at him like that.

While they might not like X's therapist moments, they couldn't deny he was pretty dang good at it.

"I promise I'm fine," the younger repliod finally spouted, "If I think somethings wrong I'll tell you alright? I'm going to go back to my quarters to rest up. Later!" Axl dashed away as to avoid any more questioning.

X watched him go, confused.

"Told you he wouldn't say anything." Zero pointed out, "Although I think you almost cracked him there."

"Usually that works…" X had discovered that the best way to get Axl to talk was to just wait. He was a very talkative and impatient repliod, eventually he would break from the continuous silence.

"Whatever he's keeping he doesn't want to tell." The red hunter thought aloud.

"And it seems to be bothering him a lot too… If things get too bad I guess he'll come talk but right now-"

"He's not going to budge."

X sighed and headed toward the control room, "Maybe we can ask Pallet if she knows anything. He did say that they were talking earlier."

"Later. You seriously need to relax." His friend hooked his arm around the light bot's neck and started leading him down the hall.

X didn't seem too happy about it but went along, knowing that Zero would be as stubborn as Axl was being. "Fine…"

The crimson repliod rolled his eyes, "Worrywart."

He received an elbow to the gut from the said worrywart.


	9. Remembering

**I am now in a** ** _very_** **good mood. Apparently there is a ThinkGeek near where I am and I just got back from there. I now have a megaman plush and he is super cute and I am super happy so have another chapter. If I keep going at this pace though I might run out of chapters. X3**

Madelyn spun her pencil around in her hand with a very annoyed look on her face. 'The Wizard', as he liked to call himself, had called all of them down for a meeting. But when they had arrived there had been no one here. They had been waiting for 15 minutes now and there was still no sign of him.

She looked back down at her paper, some rough sketches, some kids sitting by a school, her cat, just anything she could think of to stop the boredom from taking over.

"What'ch ya drawin there Mads," someone asked from behind her.

"Just stuff," She told him as she hit him with her book, "Why are you always so interested in my drawings Tigelaar?"

Said repliod smiled. He had been on this team for the longest out of the rest of the members. He had a sort of humanoid figure but none of the body proportions made enough sense. He had a large chest with smaller legs that Madelyn was surprised to could hold him up. He was mostly yellow with blue details from his chest to his legs. The yellow sort of reminded her of a bale of hay at a farm. He wasn't the brightest but he was certainly one of the friendliest. At least to other members of Gravity he was.

"You're just so good at it. You've _always_ been drawin right?"

She paused for a second before answering, "Yeah. Always."

"Be quiet you two," Tinboq scolded, receiving a nasty glare from Madelyn, "He's here."

"Finally," the female repliod muttered as the leader of Gravity walked into the room.

He walked in full of confidence. He was a tall repliod, definitely a humanoid model. He had a very square head with part black part gray hair and dark purple optics lighting up his face. He had black armor underneath a long green coat that almost reached to the floor.

"Sorry I'm late, I just had to finish up some details," he held up a rolled up piece of paper that seemed to excite everyone in the room.

Except Madelyn, "What's that?"

"This is our biggest plan yet," The Wizard rolled out the paper on a table that was quickly crowded by the mavericks eager to take a look.

Scanning through it many wicked smiles filled the room and even some cheers. But from Stella's hiding place, it made her sick.

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Axl fell face first onto his bed as soon as he entered his quarters. He stayed there for several minutes contemplating. X could tell that he was upset. Heck he could've sworn that the light bot was psychic. With those weird powers of his, how long could he keep this from him. He didn't like keeping things from them, but he had promised her and she hadn't even explained why she was acting so… non-maverickish.

Speaking of which how was she even supposed to explain it to him? It's not like they can just go to some coffee shop to talk. She _definitely_ couldn't just walk into HQ. Was he just being played?

Axl groaned, rolling onto his back. Why was he thinking so much about this? He never thought about stuff like this! It certainly wasn't any fun. How does X always do this without exploding!

He stared up at the ceiling. "Maybe I should tell them," He thought aloud, "How do I know I can trust her?"

He sat up, ready to go find the two older hunters, but just couldn't do anything more.

"Why me?" He complained, falling back onto the bed.

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X and Zero walked into the former's quarters. Zero taking a seat on the couch while X went over to his small desk in the corner of the room.

"What are you doing?" Zero asked.

"Looking for something," X replied as he dug through the contents on the desk.

"What?"

"It's- oh here it is." X pulled out a small box from one of the drawers and came back over to Zero.

Zero leaned over to get a better look as X lifted the lid, "Pictures?"

"Yeah," X picked one up, "I started putting them in here after the first maverick war with Sigma." He stayed silent for a few moments; memories flashing through his mind. "I wanted to make sure people remembered them as the great hunters they were, and I didn't want anyone else to be forgotten for how they were and remembered for virus that changed them."

Zero said nothing, absorbing X's words until a smile reached his features. "How many do you have in there?"

"Don't know. I just look at them sometimes when I'm stressed or worried."

Zero picked one up, "Heh. Storm Eagle."

X looked over. The picture showed him and Storm Eagle talking in the hallway in front of training. It had probably been taken during X's training when he first joined the hunters. "You two were close right?"

"Yeah," Zero answered, "He and I would compete in almost everything."

Seeing the sad smile on Zero's face X dug for another photo, "Who took this one?"

The picture showed X and Axl sitting in the lounge room. Axl looked like he had just been crying but had a smile plastered on his face anyway. X had a hand on his shoulder and was talking to him.

"When did this happen?" Zero asked slightly surprised at the sight of the energetic young hunter.

"After we came back from that final battle with Red and Sigma Axl sort of snapped. He had to kill his own friends after all."

"So did we." Zero pointed out.

"Yes, but he's a lot younger than us remember. And Red Alert was more a family to him than anything," He looked back at the picture again, "Alia must have come in and saw us and took the picture."

"How'd it get in there then if you didn't know about it?"

"She caught me putting a picture in here once. Now I'll randomly find pictures she put in here that I didn't even know existed."

"Heh."

As X put back the discovery a ping went through both of their helmets. X held his hand to the side of his helmet with Zero copying the action, "Alia? What's wrong?"

"Madelyn's been spotted a few blocks from here. We need you guys to intercept her."

"Does Signas know?"

"We haven't contacted him yet, no. Our first priority is to get you guys out there immediately. Axl's not answering though."

X glanced over to Zero at the mention of the young hunters name, "Don't worry about him," Zero told her, "We're on our way."


	10. Caught

**Sorry this took so long. A bunch of stuff happened at once and yeah just a bunch of the normal excuses X3. I'll try to post another chapter or two later. I need to check and see how ahead I am in my writing. Any way enjoy!**

X and Zero ran along the rooftops above the city, scanning for any sign of their target. "Alia, where is she?" X asked through his communicator.

"She should be straight ahead of you," the nav informed them.

"I think I see her," Zero announced, pulling out his saber.

X looked ahead and caught sight of the repliod as well. She was standing on the edge of the building, looking out towards the city. She glanced the two's way as they approached but did nothing to stop them.

X pointed his buster at her, "What are you doing here?"

"They wanted me to come spy on you," she admitted surprisingly easily.

"Then why are you on a rooftop where the entire street can see you barely 5 miles away from the HQ?" Zero questioned her, keeping a firm grip on his saber, "You're either up to something or not a very good spy."

"I'm better than you think. Listen-" before she finished her sentence she jumped into the air as a loud beeping came from her helmet. "Dang it," she muttered before answering.

"Wizard- I know I was spotted. Yes I'm staying out of sight. I'm not dumb enough to stand on the side of the building and just stare out at the city while the hunters are hunting _me_!" Both X and Zero raised an eyebrow. "I'm on my way back but it's not helping having a crazy maverick yelling in my ears." She stayed silent for few seconds, mouthing 'sorry' to the two confused hunters. Confusing them more. "Listen I gotta go…" she immediately cut off the line and turned back to the hunters.

"Sorry about that."

"What?" X managed, "Why did you lie?"

"Well I couldn't exactly tell him I was waiting for you two to come find me could I?"

"You were waiting for us?" she nodded, "Why?"

"Cause I need you to take me to Signas."

There was a shocked silence in the air before finally, "What?!"

"It's hard to explain," she started to look very uncomfortable, "Here," she threw her weapon to them, it skidding across the roof the last few feet, "Maybe that'll calm you down some?"

Zero gave her a suspicious glare, "Why are you doing this all the sudden? How can we trust you?"

"Uuug!" she exclaimed turning away from them; both hands moving to her face.

X and Zero exchanged glances before X started to slowly circle to see her face. He beckoned Zero over as soon as he saw it, "Look," he whispered, "I think she's crying."

Zero looked closer at the girls face and saw the moisture forming in the corners of her eyes. Though every other facial feature indicated anger.

"Madelyn?"

She turned around and promptly almost fell of the building. She didn't expect them to be there. She caught herself and took on a very annoyed persona. Her cheeks were pink with embarrassment. "Look can we just go?"

The two exchanged one more glance at each other before X finally answered. "Fine."

"Thank you." She said with a large sigh. She didn't even complain about having to wear handcuffs.

"Alia we're ready to come back and you won't believe what happened."

"That was certainly quick," Alia commented while typing in the command to transport them back.

"And do you mind making sure the rooms relatively clear of many hunters? Particularly rookies." Zero added.

Alia stopped her typing, "What's going on you two?"

"Like I said, you won't believe us," X told her while keeping an eye on the supposed maverick.

"Well, most are either out on missions or patrolling at this time of day so it should be devoid of many hunters."

"Good. We're ready when you are," X gripped Madelyn's arm to make sure she was included in the transport.

When they arrived the room went silent.

"Told you, you wouldn't believe me."

Madelyn was blushing with embarrassment as the entire room stared at her, "Can we go now?" she whispered to X.

X blinked. She had suddenly turned so soft spoken. Was this the same repliod they had been facing? "Uh, sure. Alia, would you inform Signas we're coming please?"

X's question snapped Alia out her gawking, "Yeah. And X," She added as they passed, "A little better warning next time please."

X gave a nervous chuckle and a small sorry to his nav before leaving the room, Madelyn snickering silently beside him. The trip to Signas's office was short with only one repliod who seemed to be too engrossed in the papers he was holding to look up at them passing them in the hall.

'That should keep gossip from spreading everywhere for a while,' Zero thought. Though the silence probably wouldn't last long since all those Navs had seen her and probably reported the incident to the hunters they were navigating.

When they arrived Zero knocked on the door and was told to enter by the voice inside. Zero entered first, "Someone's requested to see you."

"Oh really? And who might that-" Signas stopped his question short when X entered, dragging Madelyn with him.

"She said she needed to see you," X informed him.

"She didn't tell us why though," Zero added, staring at her suspiciously.

"I believe I do," Signas said, causing the two hunters to snap their heads toward him in surprise.

Madelyn looked around the room, "Hey, where's Axl?"

"Wha-" X redirected his confused gaze back at her, "Why?"

"I need to keep a promise."

"What promise?"

Madelyn smiled, "That means he kept it."

"I'll call him down real quick," Signas stated before the two could question her more, "Then we can get to the explanations."

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Axl had been generally ignoring the alerts that had been coming from his helmet, assuming that it was just Alia trying to contact him for X or something (she'd done stuff like that in the past), but when the tone of the beeping turned to a high alert warning, he gave in.

"AXL!" Alia yelled through the communicator, "Why have you not been picking up my calls?"

"Uh…" had she just put on the high alert so he would pick up and get yelled at?

"Madelyn was spotted about 5 miles from here," Axl immediately gave her his full attention.

"Did X and Zero go out to find her?" the gunner asked.

"Yes and they brought her back."

"Huh?!"

"They're in Signas office. Apparently she was waiting for them so they could take her to him."

"I'm on my way," Axl told her before jetting off at full speed down the hallway.

Was this how she was going to explain everything to him? Oh man he was probably going to be in big trouble if X and Zero found out just _what_ he was hiding from them. More like _when_ they found out _._

He entered without knocking but didn't go very far past the door. X and Zero were both giving him suspicious looks (X's containing some underline disappointment) and Madelyn was sitting in one of the chairs in front of Signas desk. She gave him a little awkward wave as he entered.

"Well, now that we're all here why don't we get this started." Signas stated.

"Alright then," Madelyn stood up, "First of all I'm going to say sorry," the three hunters each gave her _a look_ , "I had to keep up the act so I probably got on your nerves a bit."

" _A bit?!"_

"Wait, act?"

"Well, I've sorta been spying on Gravity for Signas."

"What?!" all three exclaimed.

"Yeah, that's why I kinda threatened you back at the park Axl. Thanks for keeping your promise though."

The red and blue hunters instantly turned to him. Axl flinched in response, shrinking down slightly under their gazes.

"Hey go easy on him," the now identified spy tried to defend, "I did kind of have a saber at his throat and flames in my eyes. Even Gravity tended to get scared when I was like that."

"Whatever," Zero turned away from the poor repliod, soon followed by X. Axl just looked like he wanted to die right there, "Commander, why weren't we ever told?"

"This was a risky operation. We rarely send in spies anywhere so I kept this a tight secret. I didn't want to risk anything slipping or any strange behavior between hunters and her tipping them off. So, unfortunately, that included you." Signas explained.

"Alight," X accepted the reason, even if he didn't entirely like it. He could tell Zero definitely didn't. "So Madelyn-"

"I'd rather you call me Stella. Madelyn's just what I go by in Gravity."

X stopped for a moment, "Alright. Stella. You've been spying on Gravity this entire time?"

"Yes. And they're planning something really big. That's why I had to get caught."

"Couldn't you have just sent the information over?" X suggested. He seemed to be taking this all rather well.

Stella shook her head, "This is too risky and too big. I wouldn't have even been able to take a picture of those plans without someone questioning me. And I didn't have time to make a letter or email or whatever."

"What exactly is it? What's this plan?" Signas asked, a slight anxiety entering his voice.

Stella took a deep breath, "They're going to bring down the orbital elevator."

 **Dun Dun DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN**


	11. Big Plan

**So I looked and after this chapter I have about 2 already written. I might try to post both but no promises. Both because I have a terrible memory for these things and I'm starting to get a headache for some reason and might have to stop. But hey at least I'm trying :)**

"Take down the orbital elevator?" Zero exclaimed, "How?"

"All the materials they gathered were for making a bomb. Even the potassium nitrate. Apparently it's used in black powder."

"Why wouldn't they tell you something like this?" X asked.

Stella tensed up for a second before answering, "I'm still considered too new for them to tell me all their plans. Especially something like this."

"Do you know any details?" Signas asked quickly.

"It's supposed to happen in about a week. That's when they said the bomb will probably be ready. Other than that no."

"You seem rather calm about this," Zero commented to her.

"Same to you," she retorted, "I've had a couple of hours though so a good amount of the shock has left my systems."

"A couple of hours?" Zero questioned, "Why did you wait?"

"Well I couldn't exactly just up and leave after a big reveal like that!" the teal and purple repliod argued, "Honestly if The Wizard hadn't told me to keep an eye on you guys for a bit then I probably would've had to wait until tomorrow."

"For now we'll have to try and prepare ourselves against the attack," Signas interrupted before Zero could retort, "For now you're dismissed. Don't give this information to anyone."

Stella raised her hand, "Including the whole spy thing?"

"What, are you planning on staying here?" Zero asked sarcastically.

A twinge of annoyance passed over her face but she didn't reply. Signas cleared his throat, "Her being our spy does not have to be confidential," he received various looks from the present repliods. "I would feel more comfortable if she stayed here for a time. Gravity might be suspicious if she suddenly comes back and we start preparing for their attack."

"Good. Those guys are really annoying sometimes," Stella sighed, "And insane. They keep babbling that whole 'keeping the world grounded thing' nonstop. Apparently they mean it literally. Guess it's the virus."

"In that case you should definitely stay here for a while, while I get everything sorted out," the larger repliod told her, his voice softer than his usual commanding tone. "You three are dismissed."

"Sir."

As soon as the door was closed the two older hunters turned to the youngest, who refused to meet their eyes.

"Axl."

Said gunner flinched at the mention of his name but refused to say anything or move his gaze.

"Axl." X tried again, more forcefully.

This time Axl did move his eyes closer to making eye contact. That was enough for X to start, "Why didn't you just tell us?"

"She was an enemy maverick," Zero added, "At the time she was at least."

Axl shrank at Zero's harsh tone, earning the red hunter a "Be a bit more tactful'' look from X.

"I honestly was planning on it," Axl mumbled, scratching the back of his neck, "I was just sort of have a mental crisis about the whole thing at the same time so…"

"Oh my gosh you _do_ have a crush on her."

"What?!" Axl snapped his head toward Zero, "No!"

After an elbowing to Zero's side from X, the blue bot continued, "Doesn't matter the circumstances. You shouldn't just keep something like this from us. This sort of thing is too big for us not to know."

"I didn't even know that she _was_ a spy," Axl tried to defend, "She just saved a kid and got really mad at me. I was just really confused and-"

"Doesn't matter," Zero deadpanned.

Axl stayed silent for a minute before turning and leaving for his room. They were mad at him and there was nothing he could say that would help. He just hoped they didn't stay that way.

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X and Zero quietly watched the young gunner leave. When he had turned the corner X decided to break the silence.

"Hopefully he knows to talk to us now, but I have this bad feeling."

Zero shrugged, "Kid needed to learn something and he learned it. Let him be mad for a while. He'll get over it."

"I don't think he was mad, Zero. He looked more devastated than anything."

"Hmm," the blond stared off towards the navy hunter's last know location, "I'm sure he'll be fine," he look back to his blue friend, "You're over worrying again."

He sighed, but didn't say anything else to the crimson hunter, instead choosing to walk ahead to inform Alia of their discovery before she hunted _him_ down.

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Axl changed out of his armor and flopped down on the bed. How did this happen again?

Oh right. He was an idiot who couldn't decide on telling the people he trusted with all his heart about some dumb secret from someone who, at the time, was on the complete opposite side as him. X and Zero had a right to be mad at him.

He exhaled the breath he had unconsciously started holding when he had started his little pity party and moved onto his back.

Maybe it would be better if he just avoided them for a while. That way they would hopefully cool off enough for him to try and apologize again.

He really hated the fact that were mad. It made him feel alone again. He had felt it plenty of times throughout his life. At the very beginning of his memories before Red had found him. Running away from Redalert. Every time he had to kill one of his former friends.

He shivered at the memories flooding his memory banks. Being alone was always hard on him. It made think. And thinking didn't usually end well for the impulsive repliod.

As proven by this whole incident he had managed to get himself into. This all started because he was thinking about what was going on in the girl's head. Why should he have cared? He definitely didn't have a crush on her like Zero had said. What even made him think that? There was no real reason for him to have thought about that girl. Maybe it was just the fact that they seemed to act about the same age? There weren't many other repliods with the same age set as him. Could it be that she was just so much more confusing to him than other villains?

Argh! He was thinking too hard again!

He rolled to his side and closed his eyes. Maybe a nap would help clear his head.


	12. Stella

**So I did eventually that headache did get to me and I had to sleep it off. But since I'm planning on writing all day I thought I'd post this chapter.**

 **BlueStar Palette: Don't worry. Axl will get better this chapter. Now whether he will stay like that...**

Axl woke up the next morning begrudgedly. Apparently he had slept a lot longer than he had planned to, and even then it had done him no good. He was still in the same mood as he had been before he had fallen asleep.

He decided to just wear his normal clothes instead of his armor until he decided to go on a mission. Of course that might be a while with how he felt.

He was about to decide what to do when someone knocked on his door. When he opened it he was surprised to find Madel- Stella. She was Stella the spy now. She was wearing a teal, long sleeved shirt with a short sleeved, blue jacket with white decals. She also wore jeans that she had tied a purple piece of fabric around the waist of.

She waved, slightly timidly, "Hey. Sorry if I got you in trouble yesterday. I probably shouldn't have told you to keep it a secret. I didn't really know what I was supposed to do in that situation."

"Uh, it's fine," it wasn't really, but she seemed sorry and he wasn't really sure how else he was supposed to reply, "What are you doing here?"

"Er, I just thought I'd come by and make sure everything was alright. Signas gave me a room not far from here so…" she started scratching the back of her head.

"Um, alright." She turned back down the hallway and quickly walked away, trying to keep any passing hunters from noticing her.

Axl quickly shut the door as the awkward encounter ended and sat down at his cluttered excuse of a desk. For the next hour he just browsed through the internet, trying to find something interesting to distract him.

When he finally ran out of things to do he went down to grab something to eat from the lounge area. Getting something sweet usually helped cheer him up.

As soon as he arrived he regretted it. X and Zero were sitting at one of the tables talking. He didn't think that he was ready to talk to them again. He still felt really bad about yesterday even with his continuous attempts to make himself feel better.

He started making his way over to the booth where they sold food when he noticed a girl curled up with a notebook on one of the couches nearby. It was Stella. After a small war inside his head he headed over to the huddled form on the couch.

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Axl's attempts to go unnoticed by his friends had failed. X had noticed his presence almost as soon as he had entered the room. His uncomfort at seeing the two worried him.

"X?"

Said repliod looked up at Zero as he called him of his thoughts. "I think Axl still feels bad about yesterday."

"Oh?" the red hunter scanned the room, finding said gunner quickly walking across the room, trying to avoid catching their attention. "Hm. I didn't think he would dwell on it this long."

X sighed. Axl had stopped in the middle of the room and was looking at a girl on the couch. After a moment he started walking toward her.

"Who's that?" Zero asked.

The girl looked up and they both realized that that was a dumb question.

X answered him anyway, "That's Stella."

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Stella looked up as the spikey haired repliod approached, "Oh, Axl. What's up?"

"Um, nothing," Axl replied uncharacteristically shy. But how was he supposed to act around a former enemy? "I was just wondering what you were drawing."

"Oh," Stella turned the notepad around to reveal a sketch of a blond boy in a black jumpsuit, mask, and cat ears. Despite the strange subject the drawing was actually really good. "It's a character from an old cartoon I like."

"It's awesome," Axl told her with a smile.

Her face seemed to light up at the praise, "I have some more if you want to see."

"Sure," Axl sat down next to her as she flipped through the pages of the book.

"I've just been sketching random things that pop into my head. I had trouble sleeping last night so I was able to draw 3 or 4."

There were 4. One was a girl surrounded by pillows with a set of headphones on, listening to music. A few music notes were drawn above her. The next had 3 kids sword fighting outside. They all looked like teenagers. One of them was holding a cardboard tube instead of a sword like the other two, which he guessed were fake. The third was a rather small drawing of a long haired girl kicking the air. She was wearing one of those tacky ninja outfits like in animes. The last was actually of him, X, and Zero. In fact, it was of their first meeting with Stella. Or I guess Madelyn.

"You drew this from memory?" Axl asked.

She blushed slightly, "Sort of. It's not really hard to draw a bunch of wreckage and stuff. Still feel bad about that…"

"Well, no one got hurt right?"

"Yeah, I made sure of that. Actually how is that little cat that took a liking to you?"

"Oh, Kimyona?"

"Kimyona? _That's_ the name you gave her?" Stella asked with a small giggle.

Her reaction seemed to fluster the boy, "Well, it means 'strange' in Japanese so I thought, since we were so confused by her-"

"Do you always babble this much?"

Axl huffed at the teasing question she gave him, making the teaser laugh again.

This was actually going well. How was this even working? She was acting so comfortable around him, like they were never enemies.

"You okay?"

He jumped out of his trance, slightly embarrassed. "Sorry, it's just…" what the heck, "Why do you seem so comfortable? We were enemies not too long ago."

She blinked at the question, then closed her eyes as she tried to find an answer, "Maybe that's just it," cue confused sound from Axl, "We _were_ enemies. But you seemed to be okay with walking over here and talking with me anyways."

"Honestly I wasn't entirely sure about that."

Stella gave a short chuckle, "I could tell. But you still did and you seem to have gotten comfortable with me too."

It took Axl a minute to realize that he did. But the reason… "I guess that's because there aren't too many repliods here that are so similar to me."

"Uh, I don't exactly have a copy shot or anything. Mind explaining?"

"I mean, you're coming from a group that makes you not really that popular among the hunters like I did when I first came here. Even if the circumstances are a bit different," Axl explained, "And there aren't that many teenage repliods around here either. What age are you set to anyway?"

Stella seemed to tense for a moment before replying, "Oh, about 16."

"That's about mine. What made you become a spy?" Axl seemed to have suddenly turned to a curious mood.

"That's a bit complicated…" she didn't seem to want to go much farther into the matter. That's when she seemed to notice the bullet around his neck, "What's with the necklace?" she asked, poking at it, "Is that a real bullet?"

"Yeah. Actually it's the bullet I shot my first bulls-eye with. Red let me dig it out of the target after I shot it. It took me like an hour."

"That's really cool," she looked around the room and noticed the red and blue hunters across the room looking at them. She gave them a small wave and smile that Axl seemed to miss and went back to talking, "What's it like over here anyways?"

"Depends. During a big maverick outbreak there are people everywhere. It's chaos. Otherwise things are usually a bit laidback. There are still a lot of people out and about but it's a lot calmer and we can pick our missions and when we take them. We still have to do a certain amount of them but we get to go at the pace we need. And depending on your rank you have certain patrols you have to do too," he explained, "Why?"

"I think I'm going to switch to being a normal hunter after this whole thing is over with," she started fiddling with her pencil in her hand.

"Think you can handle it? Spy training probably teaches you different things than normal hunter stuff," he teased.

"Oh I didn't have training," she received a confused glance, "I learned everything on job. Actually I learned to fight there too," confusion turned to shock, "I said it was complicated didn't I?"

She laughed at the sheer amount of surprise that was occupying the boy's face, earning a little push from said boy.

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The two senior hunters felt a bit awkward being caught by Stella but kept watching. They were surprised at how easily the two were getting along just as Axl had been.

'He's acting more normal than he has with us lately,' X sadly noted.

"Wonder what's gotten into him?" Zero thought out loud.

X considered the question but couldn't think of an answer. He heaved a sigh as he continued to watch the two. From the few snippets of the conversation he heard, she actually didn't seem like a bad person. Of course she wasn't. She had been just acting the role she had been given before. Which, unfortunately, placed her in a place to receive a lot of hate.

"Maybe we should talk to Stella later," he acquired a quizzical look from his blond friend across from him, "She was playing a part. And if she can get Axl smiling that quickly she can't be that bad."

"It's not that hard to make him smile."

"Lately it has been."

Zero stayed silent for a few moments, considering X's words, before giving in, "Alright. You probably wouldn't give in until I agreed anyway."

X smirked, "Pretty much. Yeah."


	13. Surprisingly Good

**I finish another chapter so here ya go. Please R &R!**

About half an hour later Stella left due to the large amount of hunters that had started filtering in. She grabbed her notebook and pencil (which she lost somewhere in the couch and had to get Axl to help find it) and said goodbye to the red head as she left. Axl started heading for his original destination in a better mood than he had been.

X watched the girl leave before grabbing Zero and following her, "Hey, Stella."

She spun around, almost falling in the process, "X? Uh, hi."

"Hi," Stella fidgeted around uncomfortably, "Relax, I just want to talk to you."

"Heh," she scratched the back of her neck, "That obvious huh?"

X gave her a small smile, "A bit, yeah."

"Don't feel bad," Zero told her, "There are theories that he's physic going around."

Stella snorted while X elbowed him in the side, "Anyways, things might be a little weird around here for you."

"Understatement," he barely heard her mutter under her breath.

"Is everything alright?" he asked, ignoring the quiet comment, "Nobodies confronted you or anything?"

She gave him a curious look, "No. I've been keeping low so no one would make a fuss or anything. I honestly didn't think you would care that much though."

X blinked, "Why?"

"Well I was kinda a jerk to you guys. Even if I was acting. And you guys are more serious than Axl so I wasn't really sure what to expect," her cheeks were tinted pink as she explained herself.

"X is a big softy so you don't have to worry about that," Zero commented, causing Stella to snicker quietly.

"Why did I bring you again?" X questioned to his smirking friend. Stella laughed out loud now.

"You've got a good sense of humor don't you?" Zero asked.

"I guess. Just don't make too many puns. You might get hit."

"You'll be hitting Axl a lot then."

She laughed again, sounding much more relaxed than before, "Guess those rumors about you guys were wrong."

"Rumors?"

"All the Gravity members said you guys were super serious war bots who could destroy anything in front of them. Of course this was during the time when they had practically no moral."

"Do we really come off like that when we working?" X turned to Zero who shrugged.

"Maybe a little. But you seem a lot looser than that now. Kinda relieved," she sighed, "I'm not exactly a serious girl most of the time."

"Yeah, you'll fit in fine after a while," X told her.

"And how long will that be?"

"Well, it took Axl a few months for people to at least calm down." X recalled.

" _Great_."

"You'll be fine," X told her, "You're obviously tough if you can survive in an environment like that and not get caught. This'll probably be nothing compared to that."

"Thanks," she smiled, "It's helpful to know a few people at least seem to like me."

She waved goodbye and headed back to her room with the smile staying with her the whole way.

"Guess she is kinda nice," Zero commented as they watched her leave.

"Too bad she shares your sense of humor though," the blue hunter received a playful punch in return.

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This day was turning out better than she had thought it would. While the encounter with Axl at his quarters had been a little awkward everything else had gone really smoothly.

The only reason she had left her quarters in the first place was because she was starting to feel cramped. They weren't small by any means but she was usually very active and staying locked up didn't really sound as appealing to her. So she toughed it out and walked over to the lounge area Signas had showed her last night, ignoring the looks she got from passing hunters.

And it had payed off. Axl had come over while she was drawing and they had started developing a sort of friendship. He might have asked a few questions she would rather he not have but overall it went really well. He had even liked her drawings.

She had been sad to leave but she had started feeling the stares of other hunters as the lounge began to fill up, so she had left, Axl staying behind.

She certainly hadn't been expecting X and Zero to follow her though. Sure she saw them watching the two, but she had just guess that they were concerned about Axl or something. She felt so relieved now because of it though. She was so sure that they would hate her when she revealed her secret. But they at least liked her. They didn't seem to have warmed up completely to her but they didn't dislike her.

She took out her notebook again, she had a new sketch she wanted to draw.

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Axl finished off his ice cream outside HQ. He didn't go out too often. Most of his life did happen in the hunter HQ. His job was there. His bed was there. His friends were there.

But since his life had turned into a big mess to him in the HQ so it was nice to be able to escape for little while. Though he was in a much better mood than he had been before. Stella had been surprisingly helpful.

He stopped in the middle of a bridge, looking down into the water, his refection rippling across the surface. It was just turning spring and it was barely warm enough for him to wear his tank comfortably. A month ago this river had been frozen. Now it flowed freely through the city. It was probably still freezing though.

Axl smiled silently to himself before noticing something in the water's refection. His smile disappeared. Along with his own face, there were multiple buildings behind him and on top of one, he saw a large silhouette watching him. It quickly disappeared when Axl noticed it.

He was about to send a distress call to HQ when suddenly his entire vision went black and he collapsed onto the ground.


	14. Dissapearance

**I just finished regionals for archery and I am tired because I had to get up early but have a chapter anyway.**

 **Btw: I hope I'm making these talks with our main repliods realistic. I kinda feel like they might be accepting her(to whatever point each of them do) a bit fast. But at the same time pretty much the rest of HQ doesn't and they were directly told her situation so... I don't know.**

 **Bluestar Palette: What** ** _is it_** **that you have in mind? X)**

Stella turned over her hand, the side completely black from the graphite she was drawing with. But she had finished it, and she was very proud of it.

It was a completely shaded and very detailed drawing of her and Axl in the lounge. Actually it was them looking for her pencil in the couch. Axl had gotten his arm stuck somehow when he had found it deep in the cushions and freaked out a bit. Stella had found it hilarious. She still did. Maybe she would give him the drawing latter.

She looked at the clock on the small side table by her bed. 10:30. There wouldn't be many hunters out around this time, and any who were would probably be on a mission.

Placing the notebook down next to the clock, she stood up and grabbed her jacket from its place on the back of the couch. The couch was really the only furnishing aside from the bed and nightstand. It was the same type as the ones in the lounge. The bed had blue sheets and covers which she actually liked a lot since blue was one of her favorite colors. Though, she had to admit that they were a bit stiff. Everything else in the room was white. Nightstand, walls, floor, everything. She guessed that whenever hunters moved into the rooms they were supposed to decorate it however they liked.

She would worry about that later. For now she was going to relax and walk around while the place was relatively empty.

Her steps echoed through the empty halls as she strolled about, directionless. She would probably get lost but she didn't really care. She'd find her way back eventually.

"Hey!"

She nearly jumped into the roof at the call. She turned back and saw a blond girl in pink running towards her. Wasn't she the one that got on to X when she first got here? X's navigator… Alia.

"Uh, hi. What's up?" the nav seemed disheveled which was strange since she worked behind a computer all day.

"X said that you were with Axl earlier," Alia said.

Stella wasn't sure how to reply, "Yeah? That was a while ago though. Why?"

"We can't find him," she told her, looking quite disappointed by her answer.

"How long has he been gone?"

"Since about 5. He's not replying to any calls. We can't locate him either."

Stella felt a pang of worry establish itself in her, "Do you have any leads at all? When did you guys realize he was gone?" she asked.

"A couple of hours ago. All we have is the location where his signal disappeared. But that didn't lead us anywhere."

"Disappeared?" she started tapping her fingers against her leg nervously, "That's- not a good sign."

"Do you know what he was doing after you talked with him?"

"He stayed in the lounge when I left. I don't know what he did after that. Sorry."

"It's fine. I didn't think you would."

"Do X and Zero know?"

"Yes and now they won't stop pacing around the mission room. X keeps trying to help but he can't really do much here until we get a location. I'm pretty sure he's blaming himself for this."

"Why?"

Alia sighed, "That's just the type of repliod he is. He's been really worried about him lately since he's been acting so weird around him and Zero."

Stella winced, "That's more my fault than his…"

"No, they've got some blame in this too. They were a bit too harsh on him when they found out that he'd been keeping things from them," Stella winced again, "But X also told me about you, and I don't really blame you much for doing all that. You seem nice from what he said."

"That explains why you're being so nice to me," she admitted sheepishly.

"Heh. Hey I think it'd be nice to have another girl around to help keep those boys in shape. The fact that you could keep up with them in a real fight means you're more than qualified."

Stella tried to cover up her laugh but to no avail. "I'll try my best."

Alia smiled at her, "Thanks. I need to get back but come by later and I'll fill you in alright?"

"Sure. Thanks, Alia."

She watched the nav leave, trying to determine whether the encounter was good or bad. On one hand she had found another repliod that seemed to like her okay and X seemed to be saying good things about her to others. But on the other she had learned that Axl was missing and no one had any clue as to where he might be.

It was when she had turned the corner that she thought of something. Something that she hoped she was very wrong about.

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X could tell when Alia had first run up to him that something was wrong. Her hair had been messed up and she had an urgent air about her. Just the disheveled look usually meant trouble.

When she had told him that Axl had gone missing his heart dropped. He had instantly questioned her until she ordered him to stop. She dragged him down to the mission room where Zero was waiting, looking very aggravated. Of course X could see how much the red hunter was worried under angry cover.

They stayed there for a couple hours, Alia going in and out to receive any more information and the other two constantly typing away at their screens trying to make contact with him, pick up his signal, anything.

X had tried to help out multiple times but he was always sent away, being told that he didn't know how to do any of this and that he would be getting in the way.

He just couldn't stand just standing around and waiting. Axl could be in trouble! And he was pretty sure this was partly his fault, no matter how many times Zero assured him otherwise. He could tell Axl had been really hurt when they had gotten on to him. But he hadn't done anything about it. Even when he showed obvious discomfort when he saw them in the lounge the next day. He should have talked to him. Told him that they weren't mad or anything. Just worried. And now he was missing and no one could find him.

"X," Zero took him out of his trance, looking very sternly at him, "Stop beating yourself over this. It's not going to help find him."

X sighed, leaning against the wall. Zero put a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to comfort the light bot. X smiled at him, recognizing the gesture, but it felt and looked fake.

"It'll be fine buddy. We'll find him."

"I hope so."

"We're receiving an unauthorized transmission!" Alia instantly gained the attention of the two hunters who were next to her almost instantly.

"Can you tell who it's from?" all heads turned to Signas, who was standing in the doorway.

"No. They're coming up on the monitor though."

Everyone grew silent as they watched the large screen flicker to life. At first all that showed was static, but slowly a silhouette started to form.

"Hello Hunter HQ. I am the leader of Gravity, and I would like my soldier back."


	15. Plan(s)

**I just finished my first animation and I am happy with myself. I might try animating some stuff from some fics later. I just realized that this site has become a sort of diary for me... oh well. Hopefully I'm not boring you guys.**

 **Enjoy the chapter and please review! :3**

 **BlueStar Palette: You're not giving away any spoilers don't worry. Some of the stuff I knew would be predictable since this is sort of a thing to help clear out my head and just to have fun with. Though I will admit you got a small part of that kinda wrong but not really. You'll see. It's still what's going on. And now I'm just curious about what you thought it would be X3**

The large face projecting itself onto their monitor smirked as he received glares from all around the room.

"How did you manage to get on this frequency?" X asked, completely ignoring the maverick's demand.

"We've managed to acquire some very sophisticated equipment lately so, with a bit of work, it was quite easy to send this little message," his whole aura seemed to leak arrogance, "Now then if we can get back to the business at hand."

"You want Madelyn back," Signas deadpanned, "What would make you think we would just give her back?"

"Well, if I recall correctly, one of your top hunters should be missing right about now as well. Am I correct?"

X felt a spark of rage ignite inside him as he realized what the repliod was implying. He looked over at Zero who, by the look of it, was probably very close to throwing his saber and the oversized maverick head.

"We could help you find him if you'd like, but of course we would need payment. You already know what type of payment I require. I'll give you some time to think on it," there was a yell somewhere in the distance of the video, "Better not take too long though. Who knows what kind of trouble that boy's gotten himself into."

The screen cut out and the room went silent.

Until, "I was afraid of this…"

All eyes turned to the brown haired girl peeking out from the door. Stella.

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When she had arrived at the mission room to tell Alia her suspicions she had not been expecting to hear the Wizard gloating on the large monitor inside. And of course he had confirmed her suspicions. She felt so sick. This was all her fault.

"Stella?" she looked up as X brought her back to reality.

"It came to me that it might by Gravity after we talked Alia," she told them, feeling her heart sink more and more with each word, "I was coming down here to tell you. And they just got some weird gadget that could block out any signal, so I was completely sure."

"It'll be fine," Signas told her gently, "But if we want to get Axl back you'll have to go back to Gravity for a while."

"It's not that simple," she combed her hand through her hair, "Gravity was a procedure for stuff like this. They made it after they actually started succeeding. As soon as they get me back they'll kill Axl. Heck they'd probably have _me_ do it."

"Does that mean Axl might be…"

"No, I don't think so," Stella bit her lip, "They'd probably keep him alive so that they could try and convince you by letting you hear or see him. They just did that with that yell. So I'd say he's relatively safe for now."

Everyone heaved a sigh of relief. But they weren't out of the water yet. "Then how are we going to get him out of there? Did we manage to get a lock on their location?"

All three navs sadly shook their heads, "They managed to conceal it the entire time they were broadcasting," Layer informed them, "We couldn't get a lock."

"Stella, you know where their hideout is, correct?" Said repliod jumped at Signas's question.

"Yes but there are multiple. We have one main one that we were at most of the time but I don't know if they would move him to a different base or not. I can make a list of them if you want."

"That would be very helpful. Thank you."

Stella nodded, "Okay. Come by my room in a little bit and I'll have it ready."

She quickly left while mumbling to herself. They all just assumed she was going over the different base locations.

"We'll have to be really careful about this," X commented, "If they realize that we've found them then this could all be over."

"Don't worry X," Zero told him, resting a hand on his friend's shoulder, "We've done harder. We'll get him back no problem."

Stella on the other hand had a different plan in mind.

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About half an hour later X was headed down to her room to pick up the coordinates. When he knocked on the door it partly creaked open. Confused, he opened it the rest of the way to find the room empty. He walked inside, looking around at the abandoned room for any sign of its occupant.

He notice a small piece of paper taped on the wall opposite of the door. He gently removed it from its spot on the wall, being careful not to tear it. He read the words on it multiple times before rushing off to tell the others.

 _I'll go get him._

 _~Stella_


	16. Breakout part 1

**Welp, heres part one of the breakout. I actually had a lot of fun with this one. I'll try to post part two later tonight or at the most tomorrow. I'll need to write some more though. After part two I'll officially be caught up.**

Madelyn pounded on the door to the base while Stella screamed and yelled at her from the back of her mind. But she was committed and she definitely couldn't turn back now. Besides what other choice did she have?

Multiple weapons activated above and around her but she paid them no mind. They would recognize her signature.

She stood there for several minutes tapping her foot impatiently. Maybe they did move bases?

Just as the question came to her mind the door swung open, "Madelyn!"

Glinda. She was the only other girl on the team and Madelyn wasn't quite sure if she liked her or not. She was a small humanoid repliod who wore a lot of pink. She always seemed to sparkle which really threw off the whole bad guy thing. But she was quite powerful. She had an attachment to her back that blew out multipurpose bubbles. Doesn't exactly sound threatening but with all the stuff she could do with them you definitely need to watch yourself around her. She would talk about how annoying all the guys could be with her which had helped her get through this some but at the same time she was a bit too girly for her to really feel comfortable around her. Okay a _lot_ too girly.

"You're back!" she was glomped be the sparkly girl with so much force she almost wiped out.

"How?" The wizard stood in the doorway along with the rest of Gravity.

"I escaped. How do you think? That call you made distracted them enough that I could slip away. You were very loud by the way," she bluffed. No indentations of the lie showed anywhere.

"You shouldn't have been caught in the first place."

"Well I probably wouldn't have if _someone_ hadn't been yelling in my ear and distracting me," she managed to detach Glinda and made her way towards the door, "Didn't you say you had a captive or something?"

"I _implied_ it," he corrected, ignoring the accusation directed at him.

"Riiight."

"Well now that you're back with us though we can go ahead and dispose of him. Perhaps you'd like to do the honor?"

Stella felt raged start to bubble up in her, about to burst. "Sure," Madelyn said, completely unfazed, "Later though. I'm exhausted."

And with that she headed off to her room, leaving behind the rest of her "team". Right before she got to her room however, she scanned the area around her checking for any presences and took out her secret weapon.

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To say the hunters were frustrated would be an understatement. To say that they were annoyed would be an understatement. To say they were worried would _really_ be an understatement.

They had all read Stella's short letter. X had run in with it and instantly handed it to Signas. At first they had assumed that it was the coordinates but by the look that dawned on Singas's face, they quickly realized that they were incorrect.

Zero had gone back to pacing the room with an aggravated expression. X was sure that he would start making a hole in the floor at some point or another.

"She's gotten a lot bolder," Signas commented, seemingly to himself, "In a way that's a good thing but…"

"Commander?"

The large repliod raised his head toward the blue bot and his quizative look. "When I first met her she was very nervous. It took me a while to convince her that I was a friend."

"Speaking of that," Zero cut in, "How is it that you hired her in the first place? There are some things that aren't adding up in my head. Like how you even managed to get her into Gravity in the first place."

Signas stayed silent, keeping eye contact with the blond hunter, "That," he eventually spoke, "Is a matter we'll have to revisit later."

Zero didn't seem happy with the answer but he didn't speak out against him.

A frustrated sigh came from the navs stations. "I can't get a lock on her," Alia told them.

"It seems that she's used one of the motorbikes," Layer imputed, typing away at her computer.

"Can you track it?" Zero asked walking up to the purple haired nav's station.

Her face lit up a bright red before answering, "S-sorry. It seems that she's turned off the tracking somehow."

"I guess we'll just have to trust her," X leaned against the wall. His eyes showed he was still trying to go over everything. Anything that could give them a hint despite his statement.

Zero sighed, walking over to the light bot and copying his actions, "I guess so…"

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Axl wrestled with the chains at his wrists. How could they be so strong?!

He dropped his arms down to his sides. He was going to run out of energy if he kept at this. But what else could he do?

When he had woken up he had instantly tried to jump to his feet but had instantly been pulled back down by the length of his restraints. After getting over his initial shock he had taken in his surroundings. Three gray cement walls were placed to the sides and behind him. In front of him was a thick clear wall.

His chains that were holding him to the back of the room appeared new. They were a shiny white color that didn't seem to scuff no matter how much he slammed them against the wall or clawed at them. They cut into him badly. Which worried him since he _was_ made of metal. He guessed that they must have been custom made to hold repliods.

The restraints did more than just cut into him though. Later on he had heard people talking. When he heard X and Zero's voices his heart had leapt. But soon afterward he felt a powerful shock course through him. He had yelled out loudly in surprise. It stopped very quickly but his senses were scrambled.

His vision was going in and out and there was a loud ringing in his ears. He could barely put a thought together but the one his did manage involved a lot of cussing. Most of which he had learned from Zero.

X would probably kill the crimson hunter if he knew. Honestly he wasn't even sure if the blond had realized that he was cussing when had said all those things.

Axl laughed to himself. They were probably going to kill him in here. He could tell that much. And, surprisingly, it wasn't as unnerving as it should have been. Maybe it was just all the near death encounters he had already had.

He did miss his friends though. He wondered what they would do if he really _did_ die here. Palette would try to find a way to kill him again probably. Maybe he'd just come back like Zero had multiple times. Maybe he'd see Red Alert again. If that was even possible for repliods…

He sighed, running his hand through his hair. How exactly was he supposed to get out of this?

The answer came in a very surprising form.

"Yo."

Axl would have hit the ceiling if he wasn't chained to the wall. Stella was sticking her head out of a door that had suddenly emerged from the wall next to him. "Wha-" he managed.

She laughed at the red head before taking out her saber and cutting him loose, "Come on. I'll explain once you're out away from this stinky cell."

He didn't complain. He grabbed the hand she offered him, stood up, and allowed himself to be dragged through the hidden door. Behind it was a long narrow passage way that seemed to twist and turn endlessly.

Stella closed the door, which seemed to minimize the amount of space available. She grabbed his still shackled wrist and led him all throughout the paths with ease. He could barely see anything. He more felt the walls than saw them.

"What is this?" he asked.

"It's something the former occupants left behind."

"Former occupants?"

He faintly saw her nod, "There used to be another group of mavericks here. We took them out but I managed to get some info out of one of them. I offered to let him go if he gave me some info on the building. I was new enough that someone managing to get away wasn't a very big deal. He told me about these. He said something about being able to use them in case of an attack," she scoffed, "They didn't use them when we attacked though. I'm pretty sure that most of them were too far gone to make any rational decisions."

"You sure know your way through them," he commented as she pulled him around another corner.

"Well yeah. How do you think I managed to sneak past the cameras so easily?"

She stopped suddenly, causing Axl to ram into her. He was about to question her when her hand covered his mouth. Voices were faintly coming in through the other side.

"Madelyn sure is talented."

"Yeah. She seemed pretty annoyed with the Wizard though."

"Well he did start yelling at her while she was trying to get away from S rank hunters. I'd understand why she would be upset."

"True. She wasn't that bold when we first found her though."

Found?

Before they could hear anything else Stella yanked him away, running as fast as she could. When she finally stopped she slumped against the wall.

"Stella?"

She didn't need to see him to know what he was thinking. "It's really complicated and I'd rather not talk about."

There was silence between the two before Axl finally spoke, "Alright. Let's just focus on getting out then."

"Right." She grabbed his arm again but before they even took one step a siren rang throughout the building.

They had realized Axl was gone.


	17. Breakout part 2

**Heres part two of The Breakout! This was a posted a bit later than I planned but I still technically made the deadline I set for myself. So enjoy!**

Stella silently swore to herself. They figured it out pretty fast. Someone must have come by to gloat about Madelyn being back or something. Well either way they were going to have to step up the pace.

She started running again, dragging the startled Axl behind her. But what were they going to do about the defenses. Those things were hard to get by. Madelyn would be fine since she was a part of Gravity but Axl was an outside enemy. A captive even. And he had no armor to protect him either.

She stopped again, this time slower so that Axl wouldn't run into her, "Keep running forward," she instructed moving so that she was behind her, "There'll be a door eventually. Open it enough that you can see the defense system. As soon as they go down run to the bike I parted not too far away. I'll be right behind you."

"Wait. Isn't this going to blow your cover? Isn't there something else we could do?"

Stella smiled, "We've run out of options. There might have been another way but we didn't have enough time. We only had a couple of hours until they were going to kill you."

Axl shivered a little bit. So he had been right about that.

"Besides, really no matter what they were going to figure it out. The plan

the others had would have showed that I had given them information and they'd instantly label me a traitor. And honestly most other plans might have gotten you killed. If they hadn't noticed so quickly I might have at least had time and could have convinced them I was on their side. But that's down the toilet now so we'll have to go with this," she turned him around and pushed, "Now go!"

He did as he was told, though rather hesitantly. He almost slammed against the door that she had told him about. He peeked out and saw multiple guns and other automated weapons scanning the yard, looking for him. Did they really get all this from just stealing?

He looked back the way he had come. "Where are you Stel?"

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Stella was having a bit of a crisis. She was right next to the secret entrance to the defense system, the only problem was The Wizard and Glinda were inside talking.

"How?" Glinda kept repeating.

Wizard was having quite a time trying to calm her down. "Stop this and come on," he eventually ordered, "We need to find him."

The sparkly repliod snapped out of her ranting and turned toward the door ready to follow the order. Stella felt a leap of joy before, "Where's Madelyn?"

The Wizard paused for a moment and Stella instantly felt every shred of joy that had entered her shatter, "I don't know. She probably ran off somewhere when she heard the siren now hurry up."

Glinda didn't look happy with the answer but did as she was told. Was she already getting suspicious? She waited a few minutes before deciding to come out. Silently she disabled all cameras and defenses that blocked passage out. Unfortunately it wouldn't last forever. They had a backup generator that would activate in about 5 minutes.

She could probably make it out to where Axl would be waiting but it would be close. Really close.

She jet back into the passages, barely remembering to close the door behind her. She navigated through them with ease as she sped through with every ounce of energy she could. 4 minutes… 3 minutes… 2 minutes…

She saw the light of an open door in front of her. Axl must have left it open when he had run through. She quickly closed the door behind her so that Gravity couldn't learn how they had escaped.

1 minute…

She ran through the yard and deactivated weapons, hardly paying attention to anything other than her and Axl out.

45 seconds…

Axl was waving at her, perched on the motorbike she had brought for their escape.

20 seconds…

She made it to the bike and Axl helped pull her behind him and started the engine.

0 seconds…

They had managed to get going as soon as the generator kicked in. Stella looked back right as the final gun, the furthest one boarding the perimeter, locked on to them and fired.

"Axl!"

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"Oh my gosh!" Layer yelled, making everyone in the room jump. "The bike that Stella took is sending off a distress signal."

"Quick get the coordinates," Alia told her as everyone crowded her screen.

"Already on it," she stared intensely at the screen, her fingers flying across her keyboard as she locked on to the bike. "I've got them!"

Everyone cheered. Until, "Wha-? The signal…"

"Layer?"

"The signal's suddenly disappeared."

"Disappeared?" X questioned, instantly worried.

"It suddenly stopped transmitting. I can't get a lock on them anymore either."

X and Zero exchanged a look. They were both thinking the same thing.

"They're in trouble."


	18. Escape

**I have been helping put up the ceiling in our office and now my shoulder is super sore. Scaffolding shakes a lot. *Sigh***

 **Anyway here's a new chapter. Please R &R! Laters :3**

"Zero can you see them?"

The two hunters had immediately rushed out to the coordinates Layer gave them. The location had taken them fifteen minutes out of the city and by now they should have been getting close.

"No," Zero replied over the wind.

How much further could they be? They were getting close to the spot. Were they still near the base? If so how had they never noticed them?

"X," Zero called to him.

He didn't need to say much more than that. X could see what had caught his attention.

In the distance, a plume of smoke was rising into the sky.

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Stella's systems were screaming at her. Any and every movement she made was difficult. Despite the pain she sat up, looking around for the red head that had been driving.

She had grabbed him, pulling him off the bike, right before the projectile had made contact with the bike. There was a deafening explosion and they were flung away. Now they were here. On the ground. Barely functioning.

She found him a few feet away, unconscious. He looked badly injured too. 'That's right,' she realized, 'He doesn't have any armor. He took the full grunt of that explosion.'

Ignoring the pain, she stood up and walk over to him. Part of his shirt had burned off and the bottom half of his arm was completely black. His face was contorted in pain. He let off soft moans every once and a while.

Stella gently picked him up and tried to coax him back to consciousness, "Axl! Axl come on."

She wasn't sure if it was working but she kept going. She sat with him doing this for several minutes before finally his eyes started to flutter open.

"Wha-"

"Axl!" she helped him sit up, "Are you okay? Wait. Dumb question. Never mind."

The gunner gave a pained laugh. That meant he couldn't be _too_ bad off… right.

Stella looked back to the path and realized that they had actually been thrown a few miles away from the bike. She could see the charred remains sitting there sending smoke into the air as if the attract anyone nearby to try and help it.

Wait. "Axl we gotta get moving. That smoke is going to give our position away."

"We won't be able to get far in this state," he pointed out.

The teal hunter whipped her head around frantically, trying to find a way out of their predicament. She found it in the form of a forest.

"Come on. We can hide in there."

"Won't they search the forest? It's sort of obvious."

"We're quite a ways away so I don't think they'll look this far in. If we're lucky they might assume we died in the explosion. Besides, they're really lazy," She wrapped her arm around his waist and helped him to cover, "The real problem is how we're supposed to get back to HQ like this."

"I've got that handled," Stella gave him a quizzical look, "I sent out a distress signal as soon as I got to the bike. Hopefully they got the coordinates before it blew."

She sighed in relief, "Yeah." She looked back to the bike and froze. Gravity was standing all around the remains looking very confused. They stood there for several minutes talking before someone was sent into the forest. Time seemed to stretch as she waited for them to come back out. Or find them.

When they reappeared with the rest of the group she almost collapsed in relief. They finally left and she actually did collapse. Axl let of a small yelp of pain and Stella gave him an apologetic smile before lying on her back.

"So now we wait."

"Yep."

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X and Zero skidded to a stop at the source of the smoke. At least now they knew why it had stopped sending off the signal. But where was the driver who sent the signal.

Zero ran into the forest to find some trace of the two while X stayed near the bike to look for clues. They were a few miles from what he assumed was Gravity's base. There was a large black dot about a mile down the path that he assumed was the spot the bike went boom. Hopefully their two missing hunters hadn't been on when that happened.

He started to hear something behind him that he assumed was just Zero. But as the noise continued and started getting louder he realized it wasn't his red partner.

He spun around toward the sound. Stella was frantically waving at him from a few miles down the road. They had passed them! "Zero!" he called as he started running toward her.

The blond quickly came out of the foliage and saw her too.

"Are you okay?" X asked as the two arrived.

"More or less," she replied leaning against a tree, "It's Axl that's got the worse of it."

"Where is he?" Zero asked quickly.

"Over here," She led them through the trees to where the injured Axl was sitting against a tree.

The two had to double take at their friends state be they rushed over to him. Axl smiled at the two when he saw them, "Hi guys."

"Axl what-" X knelt down next him.

"Most of this was the bike," he told him. It sounded like it was hard for him to talk, "I'm really glad to see you guys."

X put an arm around his shoulders, "We're glad to see you too pal. Let's get you out of here."

Axl nodded and stood up with X, putting most of his weight on the blue bot. Zero messed with the younger's hair and followed.

"You're going to need a ride too huh?"

Stella smiled, "That would be appreciated, yeah."

Zero returned the smile and they all set out to go back home.


	19. Recovery

**This took a while but lot of stuffs happened including having to put down my cat and one of my friends acting like a complete idiot and jerk and yeah.**

 **Enjoy what I've got for ya here. I'm goin to sleep. :3**

Stella slowly blinked her eyes open, the bright lights flashing into her vision. It took her a minute to realize where she was. The infirmary.

As soon as they had arrived her and Axl had been taken to the medical bay. Axl had fallen asleep against X on the way. She couldn't really blame him. Being kidnapped was probably exhausting. Since she was still conscious she just walked there and passed out on the bed when she arrived.

She wasn't sure how much time had passed but she definitely felt a lot better. They must have fixed her up while she was asleep.

Stretching, she swung her legs over the side of the bed. "Going somewhere?"

Her head whipped around to see a certain blond hunter standing in the doorway. "Oh, Zero. Geez you surprised me."

"Heh," he walked over to her, smirking, "Sorry bout that. You seem to be doing better."

"Yep. Everything's back to 100 percent," she lept from the bed… and immediately slipped. Zero raised an eyebrow. "I would like to mention that that was still 100 percent. I'm just really bad at coordination when I'm not on a mission."

"I can see why you got along with Axl so quickly," he held out a hand to help her up, "Thanks for helping him out. Even if it was in a totally reckless and stupid way."

She took the hand and stood up, giving the hunter a small smirk of her own, "No problem. I specialize in those types of rescues."

"Yeah, you're going to fit in just fine."

Stella seem startled by the statement. A small smile adorned her features, "So it'd be okay if I stuck around? Even with the whole Gravity thing."

"We're smart enough to tell friend from enemy. And you were never really on their side anyway," he gave her a curious look, "Why are you so conscious about this."

"Well…" she juggled the thoughts in her head, trying to come up with an acceptable answer, "I've had an… interesting past. It's sort of altered how I think people see me a lot."

Zero stayed silent. He wanted to question her further but even he could tell she didn't want to go further into it. But what could cause her to feel like this? He decided to drop it for now, "Well since you're up do you want to come down to Axl's room? He's still out but Lifesaver patched him up so he should be alright. X is down there keeping an eye on him."

"Yeah." She practically skipped out of the door ahead of him, "Oh!" she stopped in the middle of the hall, "Let me grab something from my room real quick. I'll meet you there."

The hyper repliod jolted off down the hall before Zero could say anything. He sighed as he watched her disappear around a corner. "She doesn't know which room he's in…"

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X sat next to the bed where his young friend continued to sleep. The blue bot couldn't help but worry even though all his injuries had been fixed. The last time something like this had happened was the Lumine incident. And that hadn't exactly gone well for them either.

He looked up as he heard the door open and Zero entered, "Stella still asleep?"

"Nope. She is up and quite energetic actually," he leaned on the side of the bed, "She said she was grabbing something from her room and meeting us here. Though she did run off before I could tell her which room."

X had to cover his mouth to keep from laughing. "Guess we have a bit till she gets here then."

She really did seem to be a nice girl. It just took a bit of getting used to since their first impression had been completely different.

"Think he'll wake up any time soon?" Zero asked, indicating toward the slumbering bot on the bed.

X was about to reply when said bot answered for him as he started to stir. "Axl?" the red head turned toward his voice, sleep still eminent in his eyes. X smiled as he helped Axl sit up. "You okay?"

"Sore," he replied as he stretched his arms above his head and winced, "Very very sore."

"I'm just glad you're alive," he ruffled the younger's hair, "We were really worried."

Axl smiled, "So you guys aren't still mad at me?"

"We never really were mad, Axl," Zero told him, taking a seat at the edge of the bed, "Just a bit surprised."

Axl looked down at his sheets. X, seeing this, wrapped an arm around his shoulders, "I can assure you that Zero has done stupider things than that in the time I've known him."

"Hey!"

Axl laughed as Zero tried to protest and completely failed. He leaned into X's embrace a little more as he felt all the tension in his chest fade away. How could he think he could lose this family so easily? These guys were stuck to him whether he liked it or not. And vice versa.

"Hey where's Stella?" Axl asked when things calmed down.

"By now I'm going to guess she's running around trying to find this room." Zero looked back at the door, as if expecting her to burst through any second.

"Huh?" he looked over to X for a better explanation.

"She woke up and went to get something from her room. But she forgot to get the room number to find us."

"But she just asked one of the nurses which room to go to so it wasn't that hard." They looked over to Stella with a very pleased look on her face.

"I had a feeling she'd arrive when we started talking about her," Zero half laughed.

"I'm like Beetlejuice." She said under her breathe.

"Like what?" X asked.

"Nothing!" she didn't think he'd hear her.

"So what did you need to grab?" Zero asked.

"This," she brought out a small sketch book with a large grin.

She flipped through the pages, walking toward the bed. "Your sketch pad?" Axl asked.

When she reached the page she wanted she carefully tore it out of the book and handed it to Axl, "I was planning on giving this to you. I drew it after I left the lounge."

"Is that you with your arm stuck in the couch?" X asked as he looked at the picture.

Zero got up to look at the picture as well while Axl laughed, "Really Stella?"

Her grin grew, "It was funny. Can you blame me?"

"It's really good," X commented, "How long have you been drawing."

"Since I was little."

"Little?" Zero question.

"Oh! Uh, when I was first activated. I call it that sometimes. It's kinda silly huh?" she nervously smiled.

"Maybe a little." X smiled reassuredly.

"Do you have any more drawings?" Zero asked.

Axl smiled as Stella eagerly nodded and opened her sketch book to show off her drawings.


	20. Interigation

**Welp. This took longer than expected. Why did I start two other stories? I said I wouldn't do that when I first joined this site! I guess holding that promise for two years isn't bad but still. Hopefully the cover I'm making for the story will help make up for it. Though I am now in Texas and away from all my stuff so it'll be a few weeks till it's done. I am not the best at drawing these boys. Armor is weird.**

Axl was released the next day. X was there to greet him as he left the room holding a small bag.

"Feeling better now?"

Axl grinned at the light bot as he quickly made his way over, "Yep! All good," he instantly noticed the bag, "What's that?"

X smirked before reaching in and retrieving the contents. The younger bot jumped in joy when he saw it.

X laughed, "I had a feeling you'd like it. That sweet tooth of yours is irrepressible."

Axl snatched the ice cream bar out of his hand. "Fank ou." He said with the treat already in his mouth.

"You're welcome," his helmet buzzed, making both of them slightly jump. He put his hand to the receiver of his helmet and Axl snickered next to him, "Alia? What's up? Right now? Okay we'll be down there." Axl gave him a questioning look, though it seemed rather silly looking with the ice cream still stuffed in his mouth. "Signas wants us to come down to report with Stella and Zero."

"Oh yeah. You told me about that last night," Axl had just about finished the ice cream as he and X started making their way towards Signas's office.

X sighed as he looked at the gunner bot, "Axl, you have ice cream on you face again. Honestly you're such a sloppy eater."

Axl licked his lips of the lingering sweet with a smile, "What? It tastes good!"

X sighed again at the bots antics, "Well you better finish it up. We're almost there."

Realizing he was right, the red head finished the bar as quickly as he could and threw away the stick before they came to the correct door. X knocked and entered with Axl following. Zero was off to the side like he usually was. Stella was in the middle of the room, shrunk down as if hoping no one would notice her if she became smaller. Signas was behind his desk and nodded at the two as they entered.

"Uh," Zero pointed at Axl, "Did you give him ice cream?"

X spun around to look at the bot in question who just blinked in surprise, "God dangit Axl."

Guessing the culprit, he hastily wiped his mouth with a sheepish smile.

"So then," Signas started, "Axl, do you mind telling us what exactly happened."

"Sure," Axl nodded. He noticed Stella seemed very anxious as he started. He began with his walk outside HQ when they had found him (expressing his agitation towards the surprising speed the repliod had seemed to have) and continued from there. He started subconsciously rubbing his wrists when he told them about the shackles which worried X. Stella managed to shrink even more when he got to where she popped out of the wall. Of course everyone did instantly turn to her, so that was bound to happen.

Signas nodded when he finally completed his tale. He turned to Stella, who looked like she was about to hurl.

"You did good work, and I'm glad that you've seemed to gotten over you're-" he looked to the rest of the hunters and back to her. They all grew very curious when she violently shook her head. "But going off without permission was too far." He continued, abandoning the previous statement.

"I had to," she said very quietly, "There were too many risks with any other plan. I would've talked about it with you but we had too little time. Honestly I was planning on trying to keep my cover and stay in Gravity until I could figure out more about their plan, but they found him out too quickly."

"That would have been an even dumber decision," she winced at Signas's scolding, "You were still a bargaining chip for them. We could have-"

"I doubt it," they were all very surprised at her bold interruption, "I'm just their tool. Something they found in the trash. They wouldn't have spent too much time on me. They were probably just worried about me leaking info or something."

The three S rank hunters exchanged looks. _"Trash"._ What had happened to her?

Signas sighed. "Even so that was extremely dangerous. Just remember that this type of thing is not normally tolerated."

She nodded and quickly turned to leave, not even glancing at the other hunters.

"Um, sir," Zero said when the door shut behind her, "I have something to ask." The commander stayed silent, signaling for him to continue, "Stella just mentioned being 'found'-"

"Some guys in Gravity were talking about that too," Axl added.

"How did you meet her? What happened to her?"

Signas stayed silent, contemplating the different answers he could give, "It's a very complicated matter. I believe it would be best if she told you herself. But I'll warn you, it will definitely be difficult for her."

Both Zero and Axl looked to X, him being the resident councilor of the group. He nodded to the two and they all saluted and left.

"Her confidence seems to flip back and forth," X thought out loud.

"I've noticed that too," Zero commented, "Mostly with how people see her."

"If even Zero can tell, then it's got to be obvious. Ow!"

"Trying to get her to talk right now probably isn't a good idea. She's definitely not going to be in a mood to talk. About anything." X said.

"Right. Especially whatever this big secret is," Zero agreed.

Axl sighed, 'What are you hiding Stel?"

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Nathan fell down from the office chair he had propped himself on, onto the one below. "Hi."

They smirked and tickled the small boy making him squeal and twist away. They followed him down, leading to a short wrestling bout on the floor. "Why do I invite you over?"

"You love us and you know it," he promptly had a pillow shoved in his face.

"That's my problem."

"You're stuck with us," they threw the pillow at the speaker. Unfortunately it fell short of its target. Ian slowly clapped, "Good job."

Everyone in the room laughed.

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Stella cried


	21. Attack

**Writers block on the story meant to help with writers block... siiiiiiigh.**

 **The story is close to finished though. There's only a few chapters left after this. This story has been a lot of fun so far so I'm hoping to keep it going for the rest. Thanks to everyone who has been reading so far! And I hope you like this chapter. We've got some serious crap goin down now. X3 Enjoy!**

Stella spun the pencil around and around her fingers, the constant movement almost hypnotizing her. But not quite. Her mind was still functioning. Or processors… whatever.

She was worried that the guys would come down to confront her about all those things she said, which was really stupid of her in the first place. And no doubt Axl told them what he heard at Gravity HQ.

But they didn't. They must've figured that she wasn't in much of a mood to talk. Or at least X did. He seemed to be the most adapt at reading people's emotions.

Eventually though, they would ask. And she would have to give them an answer. But what was she supposed to tell them? The truth would probably be best but… The truth was difficult. And unbelievable. And painful.

She sighed. When had her life gotten so complicated? Or I guess technically-

There was a knock at the door. Stella jumped a few feet in the air and stared at it. Guess the guys had finally come. Another knock sounded through the room and she got up to answer it.

But it wasn't any of the guys. It was Alia.

"Um, hi?"

She seemed a bit panicked. Her grip on the doorframe was almost breaking the wood and she was fidgeting around. "Stella, when was that attack you mentioned planned to start?"

"4 days now… Why?"

"You're off by 4 days."

Suddenly Stella had issues feeling her legs. "I'm guessing you're not going to say it's 4 days _further_ are you?" Alia shook her head sadly. "Right now?" A nod. "I'll meet you down there."

Closing the door she quickly shoved on her armor as well as she could with her shaking hands. There's no way. There couldn't be. But Alia wouldn't lie. Not about this. So how? How?

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The three S rank hunters rushed in to the clicking of the navigators filling the room as people ran around the room. The whole place was on high alert.

"Where's Alia?" X asked upon noticing the blonde's absence.

"She went to see Stella," Layer informed him.

"And she's on her way," Alia's voice piped up behind them. She walked down to her computer and joined in the chorus of typing, "They've definitely moved it up. She looked like she was going to explode when I told her."

Speaking of the spy, "I'm here! I'm here!" She almost skid past the door in her hurry, having to badly back pedal to make it in the room. "How long have they been there?"

"They arrived at the elevator 10 minutes ago."

"Okay. Then we've got a little bit of time," Stella bounced from foot to foot, full of anxious energy, "They've got to get to the correct floor to get maximum damage."

"Then let's go," Axl said as he headed to the transport pad.

"You sure you're up to this?" Zero asked as he followed.

The red head huffed at the older reploid, "I'm fine Z. Life Savor gave me the all clear. Besides there's no way I'm missing this."

X turned to Stella, "And you?"

"To be honest-" her hands were shaking. It seemed to take all her energy to be able to stand there. She shook her head. "I'll survive. I know the most about their plan anyhow. I need to go."

X looked concerned, but didn't say anything as they made their way to the other two waiting. He'd keep an eye on her during the mission.

"Alright, you're being sent directly to their location," Alia typed in the commands, "Good luck."

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This was a terrible idea. This was a terrible awful thing to do and she knew it. But she was still doing it. She was still doing it because she was idiot. Idiot. Idiot. Idiot.

"Stella?"

She looked over at X. How long had she been out of it? "Yeah?"

"Are you okay?"

No. No she was not. She knew these symptoms. She didn't think it could still happen. "I'll be fine." After a few hours.

X didn't seem to believe her, but he didn't say anything. They were on a mission after all. She was glad.

But only for a second.

"Of course it's you."

But- this wasn't the correct floor.

"Wizard."

She really didn't want to be there.

The looming repliod was looking directly at her. There was no surprise. No disappointment. No amount of caring in his eyes. So she had been right. She was just their tool. They didn't care about her one bit.

It took too much effort to face him back. To look directly into those eyes. Something that she had barely cared about. She never liked his eyes. And now was no exception.

"You are quite a sneaky one," he drawled. She felt a shiver run down her spine. Since when had he been so creepy? "To think you've been playing us from the beginning." He sounded intrigued. This was like a game to him. "We found you, forgotten by the world, and you repay us like this."

She knew he would bring it up. She knew but at the same time she had hoped. Hoped beyond belief that he'd have some small strand of decency in him.

" _Shut up_." She growled. Or at least she hoped it sounded like a growl. She didn't exactly feel in control of her voice at the moment.

He turned to the boys. "You don't know do you?"

They didn't say anything. But they didn't need to. He was going to say it. He was going to say it and she definitely didn't want to hear it.

"You're working with a dead girl."

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"Where did Nathan go?"

Ian looked around before pointing, "He's on the other side of the store."

"How does he manage to sneak off so stealthily?"

"He is small."

A snicker was muffled before they reach the boy who was immediately poked by his friend, "What'ch ya lookin at?"

He pointed to the wall in front of him, "They have Fallout stuff."

"And Zelda," Ian added as he picked up a bracelet adorned with a sword.

A loud squee came from the third and they both looked over to see the sqeeer hugging a small brown plush and jumping up and down in glee.

"What? I love Eevees. You guys know that."

They laughed, shaking their heads and rolling their eyes.

"Madelyn." They teasingly sighed.

Her only response was to smile and stick her tongue out at her two friends


End file.
